SOMEONE LIKE YOU
by Amandah Leigh
Summary: Post-war, everyone is moving on with their lives, including Narcissa Malfoy. She's moving on...and moving out. Draco and Lucius are devastated. Lucius knows he can't even LOOK at another woman... but when Draco starts bringing his new coworker -and friend- Hermione Granger to Malfoy Manor, Lucius looks. The trouble is, Draco's looking too.
1. Chapter 1

**SOMEONE LIKE YOU**

The war is over and everyone is moving on with their lives, including Narcissa Malfoy. She's moving on... and moving out. Draco and Lucius are devastated to see her go. Both hope she'll be back, but considering her young lover and new lease on life, it seems unlikely. Lucius knows he can't ever even _look_ at another woman... but when Draco starts bringing his new coworker - and possible friend - Hermione Granger around the Manor, the Lucius starts to think perhaps newfound bachelorhood won't be so bad. There's only one problem - he's not the _only_ Malfoy falling for the Muggleborn witch.

 **Pairings and Notes:**

It's 2001. Severus survived the war. Otherwise, fic is DH-compliant (not epilogue, not Cursed Child)

Mostly focuses on Draco and Lucius's experiences & points of view

M-rated for future citrus but definitely slow-burn

More of a romance/humor and hurt/comfort fic than drama/angst (not dark)

All Canon Pairings (aside from Hermione/Ron and Draco/Astoria)

Draco/Hermione (DRAMIONE)

Lucius/Hermione (LUMIONE)

Lucius/Narcissa (LUCISSA)

Narcissa/others (N/A)

NOT a triad/quartet fic

Title and lyrics at chapter openings are from Adele's SOMEONE LIKE YOU which I do not own (obviously)

* * *

 **CHAPTER ONE**

 ** _"Sometimes it lasts in love_**

 ** _But sometimes it hurts instead"_**

 ** _-Adele_**

"I'm sorry, Lucius!" Narcissa eyed him over the rim of her wine goblet. She had never been much of a drinker... before. Now, while she wasn't overindulging, she was having several glasses a week, most while sitting at the best tables in the most expensive restaurants with the best looking young wizards Europe had to offer. "I have needs, and at the present, you are not fulfilling them."

"What needs?" he sneered over his own glass - whisky. Elf-made, imported. He had overindulged on it during the war, depleting his personal supply, but the Dark Lord's downfall had brought with it instant sobriety, as if by magic. He'd only recently started drinking again. Since she left.

"What needs?" She tapped one long red nail against the step of her goblet. She sighed. Neither noticed that the door to the Malfoy Manor library had opened. They were seated across from each other in high-backed leather chairs, regarding each other if mere acquaintances and not spouses of over twenty years. "What needs! Comfort. Companionship. Excitement. Engagement..." She took a long sip, never averting her sapphire blue eyes from his steel gray ones. _"Sex."_

"I can provide you with all of those things!" He sounded desperate. Pathetic, almost. Draco couldn't help feeling sorry for him. He considered backing from the room before being seen, but her next words halted him.

"Lucius, please. You haven't been able to provide me with at least one of those things since your return from Azkaban."

"I... it was difficult in prison!"

"You're not in prison now."

Draco's face twisted in concern and - though he'd never admit it to his father - revulsion. The man was impotent? And had been for five years? Such a realization was both shocking and pitiable. No wonder his mother was stepping out with other men. He supposed one could argue it was kind of her to have waited so long to do so.

"Why won't you give me more time?" asked Lucius, his hand holding firmly to the snake head of his walking stick. "Time to get better?"

"I've given you time. But you refuse to do anything to help yourself. You mope around this Manor all day, every day. I want to go out, Lucius. I want to travel. To see people. To have a life. To live! I spent every waking moment for over two years certain we'd all be dead any day - you, me, and Draco - and since we survived..."

"The wizarding world hates us! It shall never be as it was!"

"Nothing shall ever be as it was." She tapped her nails on the glass again. It was an old habit, a nervous tic. He had a feeling he knew why she was uncomfortable. He'd been waiting for this since the day she moved out. He looked her over, wishing more than anything that he could be the man he was, the man she needed. He wanted desperately to be able to take her to bed, to dominate and satisfy her as he once had, to remind her why she married him. But despite all he felt for her emotionally, no matter how damn good she looked or how badly he wanted to win her back, his body would not respond.

"You're beautiful, Narcissa." Perhaps flattery could prolong the inevitable. She always loved a good compliment, especially about her looks. "As beautiful today as you were the day I married you."

She smiled, but it was a sad smile, and it further splinched his heart. He wasn't putting her on and she knew it. She truly looked incredible today, though she looked incredible every day, in his opinion. Especially in these years since the war ended. She was put-together and perfect while he was rarely clean-shaven and had knots in his hair. He no longer cared about his appearance the way he once had. He no longer cared about much of anything, save for getting pissed off the whisky and wishing he knew how to win her back. He looked her up and down again, willing his body to react to the sight before him, but, as it had been since his escape from Azkaban, he felt... nothing.

She twirled a lock of blonde hair around her index finger to keep from tapping. Her hair was pulled mostly up, styled as if she'd just walked off the cover of a 1940s issue of COVEN (the wizarding world's answer to Vogue). Her lipstick was dark red, which matched her nails, her lashes were long and dark, her dress was floor-length and form-fitting, black with a high slit showing off one tanned slender leg. She'd just returned from Barcelona, where she'd clearly spent an abundance of time in the sun. Her toenails were painted too, she wore strapped stiletto heels, and there was a thin silver anklet delicately fastened around her right ankle.

"Where did that come from?" He gestured toward the anklet.

"A friend."

"A man bought that for you and you're wearing it here, in our home?"

"In _your_ home," she said, but it was voiced delicately, without malice. "I truly am sorry, Lucius. I love you. I am certain I will always love you, but I cannot live like this. I tried. Being confined to this place was torture enough when the Dark Lord demanded it, but this self-imposed house arrest has been killing me. Perhaps, someday, when you're ready, we'll find each other again." She stood, set down her goblet, and took two steps toward his chair. Draco slinked back between the bookshelves, hoping to continue going unnoticed. He couldn't believed he'd managed thus far; as his mother, and as a Legilimens, she had a knack for knowing where he was and what he was doing, especially when he was close enough for his thoughts to drift her way. It had been a relief for more than one reason when his aunt Bellatrix started teaching him Occlumency.

Narcissa removed a roll of parchment from a satin drawstring bag hanging from her hip.

"Divorce papers?" Lucius asked despite knowing full well the answer.

"No."

His head snapped up. His eyes, now filled with cautious hope, met hers again. "No?"

"No, but I'd like an official separation. A legal separation. I tried to open my own vault at Gringotts, but as we're married..."

"They won't allow it. An archaic rule."

"I agree." She Accioed over a quill and parchment from his desk between two picture windows. They flew right by Draco, who was holding his breath. He hadn't seen his father look so dejected and defeated since the last time the family had been punished by the monster who had once been Tom Riddle, after letting Harry Potter and friends escape their drawing room. The man's robes were rumpled, his stringy hair fell across his face, his five o'clock shadow was not becoming, and this clearly wasn't his first whisky of the day, despite it being only two in the afternoon.

"I'll sign." He dipped the quill and did as she wanted, blowing on the signature to dry it before handing back the rolled parchment. "But I do not want a divorce, Narcissa. You are my life. I love you. I cannot imagine loving another woman. Or even looking at one."

"That's flattering, dear." She kissed his forehead as she tucked the parchment back into her bag. "Let's do dinner sometime soon. There's a lovely new place just outside London, opened by a couple of witches were weren't far behind us at Hogwarts. High-end cuisine. Excellent duck, lamb, lobster. You'll love it."

"Will you be bringing your beau?"

Draco winced. The disdain in his father's voice was palpable.

"If you'd like to bring a date, I shall do so as well. If not, then no, just us. And Draco." She straightened her dress, which did not need straightening, and called out without glancing over her shoulder, "Surely you can make time to have dinner with your parents sometime soon, Draco, darling."

"You knew I was here?" He stepped out of the shadows.

"I always know where you are." She turned and smiled at him, but this, too, was a sad smile. "I'm your mother."

She departed moments later, no doubt headed to the Ministry to file the official legal separation paperwork, and presumably with the intention of spending the rest of the weekend in a hotel penthouse somewhere under a wizard hardly older the Draco. According to the Prophet, her latest 'friend' was a twenty-six-year-old Greek Quidditch captain named Panagiotis Papadakis. The very thought of his mother out with these wizards disgusted Draco. He could only imagine how his poor father felt.

"She'll be back," Lucius said before downing the rest of his drink and reaching for the bottle to pour another. "It's a phase, Draco. Don't worry. I'm sure she'll be back."

But Draco was not sure.

Draco was worried.


	2. Chapter 2

**CHAPTER TWO**

 ** _"You know how the time flies  
_** _ **Only yesterday it was the time of our live**_ _ **s..."  
**_ ** _-Adele_**

After signing the separation papers, Lucius spent several weeks even more isolated than he'd been since the war ended. Not only did he not leave Malfoy Manor, he rarely ventured outside of the master bedroom.

It was driving Draco barmy.

"You want her back, don't you?" he snapped one evening while sitting on the poofy-topped stool in front of his mother's vanity. She hadn't taken it when she moved out. She hadn't taken much. Why would she? She had the money to buy new furniture and clothes and jewelry, everything she wanted that in no way reminded her of her former life.

"Of course I do," said Lucius. He was sitting up in bed, his back to the ornate carved headboard, a tray in his lap. The house-elves were bringing food directly to him despite Draco's insistence he go down to the dining room - or, at the very least, the kitchen - to eat. Tonight's meal was brandy flamed peppercorn steak, one of his Lucius' favorites. He'd hardly touched it.

"And yet you're acting the way she... this is why... she left because... Look at yourself!" Draco stood up and gestured toward the mirror on the ceiling, a fixture he'd thought really novel as a kid but found disturbing as a young adult. Lucius looked up. He hadn't shaved in some time and his long, thinning hair was stringy and dirty. In his son's opinion, he looked very much like a haggard Muggle vagabond, the sort that always smells of piss and whisky.

"Your point?" asked Lucius dully.

"My point? Mother wants a _husband_ in her bed, not a homeless vagrant!"

"To say 'homeless vagrant' is redundant," said Lucius without conviction. He sighed and set the tray of food on the bedside table.

"I cannot live like this."

"You sound like your mother."

"I don't even know you who are, Father!" Draco plopped back down on the stool, nearly upending it (and himself). "For what it's worth, Mother loves you."

"Love?" he chuckled bitterly. "Your mother is, as we speak, in the south of France, on holiday with a Greek Quidditch player half her age." Lucius reached for the Prophet beside him in the massive four poster bed. He turned to the society pages and showed his son the black and white moving picture that had him particularly despondent today. "These days, she likely spends as much time in bed as I do. Why aren't you off lecturing her?"

"Because _she's_ not laying about in bed stinking like last week's scrambled eggs, wearing filthy silk pajamas, and-"

"She's probably not wearing anything." Lucius missed the disgusted look on his son's face as he was staring enviously down at the picture. Narcissa looked beautiful, as usual. Her hair was secured in some sort of fancy up-do, her delicate ears and slender neck were dripping in diamonds, her plunging neckline left little to the imagination, and she was smiling at Pana-what's-his-face in a way she hadn't done her husband in a decade. "She's probably naked and writhing under him as we speak, completely forgetting the fact that she ever had a husband with whom she once-"

"I'm going out." Draco stood again, returned the stool to under the vanity, and straightened his button-down shirt. He couldn't listen to another moment of this. While he knew he was his father's only confidant and was trying to lend a sympathetic ear, she was his _mother._

"Out?"

"To dinner. With a friend."

"With a lady friend?"

"Just a friend." Draco scowled. He was glad his father did not share his mother's talent for Legilimency, as he was certain neither would be happy to know which witch had so thoroughly captivated his attention as of late. He wasn't lying, though. She was indeed just a friend.

He hoped to eventually be more.

"Go on, son. Live your life." Lucius slunk down until he was on his back, staring up at his reflection. "I'll be here when you return."

Draco had no patience left for melodrama, thus he rolled his eyes and reached for his jacket, hanging off one of the four posters. "Of course you will, Father. Where else would you be?"

Upon closing the bedroom door, Draco leaned against it, needing a moment to steady himself. He closed his eyes, pressed his palms to his temples, and took several deep breaths.

"That man is _not_ my father," he said aloud.

No wonder Narcissa could go out and publicly cuckold Lucius the way she was - she probably considered the husband she once adored most unfortunately dead. And was she wrong? This shell of a man left in his place was less lively than the subjects of the portraits around Hogwarts. As much as it frustrated Draco, he could only imagine how much worse it was for his mother.

He felt badly for her. He understood. He empathized.

And yet...

And yet a tiny part of him hated her.

Hated her for leaving. For living.

For letting him stay behind, stuck.

For finally giving up.

She was leading the sort of life Draco could only dream about. Of the three of them, she'd fared best in the post-war inquisitions and trials. Draco was regarded as a coward, his father a slime who ought to be in Azkaban, while his mother was lauded for having lied to the Dark Lord. She was the entire reason he and his father weren't rotting behind bars for life. Harry Potter felt he owed his life in part to her, and speaking out in favor of releasing the Malfoy men was his way of repaying that life's debt.

Draco loathed being indebted to Potter.

And then, once they were released, the reputation recovery efforts started.

For one of them.

Draco volunteered with the efforts to rebuild the school. He donated family money to the war orphan fund. He purchased a new home for the Lovegoods and spent weeks helping Ollivander put his shop back in order. He even reached out to the Golden Trio personally, and then to his aunt Andromeda, and then to Professor McGonagall and Severus Snape and Neville Longbottom, expressing remorse for his actions and those of his parents and begging for eventual absolution. He wasn't entirely genuine in this - he still thought Longbottom was a loser and Snape was a two-timing traitor and Ron Weasley was both a prat and a prick - but he couldn't deny that he owed Potter for saving him twice and supporting his mother, and he was grateful to McGonagall for being the first to welcome him back into the wizarding world with her forgiveness, and he was glad Hermione worked in the cubical right next to his in the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes office.

He stopped in the hallway just before the front entrance to give himself a final once-over in the mirror. His hair was parted to the side, his jacket was appropriately Muggle, his shirt collar was straight, his pants wrinkle-free. He looked... good. Much better than the man upstairs, not that the elder Malfoy was currently setting a high bar.

"She's just a friend," he told his reflection. "You're lucky she's even that."

"Don't sell yourself short, dear," wheezed the mirror. "You're a handsome specimen. Carry yourself with the dignity befitting a man of your blood and stature and the witches will be falling all over themselves for you."

All of the mirrors in Malfoy Manor were charmed to puff up the denizens gazing into them. He wondered if his father's ceiling mirror had anything to say to him these days. He fought an involuntary shudder at the thought of that mirror giving positive feedback in the past, given what it must have reflected. His parents used to adore each other, and their... encounters... were not restricted strictly to their bedroom. More than once as a child he'd wandered into a room seeking a snack-preparing house-elf or parental permission to use the pool only to catch his parents in various states of undress, pawing at each other like teenagers in the astronomy tower.

As positively revolting as he'd found such behavior, these days he would prefer it to seeing his mother with other men in the paper and his father - his impotent father - confined to bed like an invalid.

With one final glance at his reflection, he hurried out, down the walk, past the gate, to the apparition point. He could apparate directly from the Manor, of course, but that required dismantling the wards until he returned and he was afraid another Daily Prophet reporter would show up at the door begging for an interview with the reclusive master of the house. Lucius had set the dogs on the last one, who just happened to be the son of a Muggle man, and it was up to Draco to smooth things over before "Old Prejudices Die Hard as Malfoy Sets Dogs on Half-Blood" made the headlines.

When he arrived at the restaurant, she was already seated. He checked his pocket watch. He wasn't late. Four minutes early, in fact. But there she was, looking every bit as beautiful as she had at work the day before. Her hair was pulled back in two french braids; he liked it out of her face. She wore a hint of makeup, dusky pink lips stick and dark mascara, no eyeliner or shadow or blush, and the scoop neck of her mahogany colored cocktail dress gave just a hint as to what her witch's robes and lambswool jumpers kept hidden. He approached the corner table slowly. She hadn't noticed him yet. Her nose was, unsurprisingly, in a book. Her cinnamon brown eyes scanned each page from left to right, left to right, before turning. She was a fast reader. But then, he knew that, from work. And from Hogwarts, though he hadn't found her bookishness quite so attractive back then.

She seemed to sense someone was staring at her. She lowered the book - only slightly - and looked to her left and right, and finally straight ahead, to where he stood, smiling.

"Draco! Hello!" She rose to greet him with a kiss on the cheek that made his chest tighten, even though this was how she greeted all of her friends, male and female, both at work and outside it. "I was early, but rather than sit at the bar nursing the one drink I can handle in a night, I thought I'd see if our table was ready. I hope you don't mind."

"Of course not!" He pulled out her chair, which seemed to surprise her. _It's not a date,_ he reminded himself sharply. _Just dinner. Between friends. Coworkers. Friends._

"Thanks! You look nice." She slipped the book in her bag, which was hanging on the back of her chair.

"As do you." He cleared his throat. "Hermione." Just saying her name aloud made the tight feeling in his chest worse. Ugh. He really was as pathetic as his father. Pining over a friend who, not so long ago, actually hated him. He wondered if she had any idea. If so, she did not let on.

"This is such a formal place!" She tugged anxiously at the neck of her dress, as if trying to turn it into a turtleneck. "I hope I'm not underdressed."

"No, not at all!" he assured her. Should he not have picked such an upscale place? Perhaps something a bit more 'everyday' would have suited her style better?

Salazar's snake, what was she doing to him?! He was a good-looking, wealthy, enviable young wizard. He'd never felt so anxious or uncomfortable on a first dates! Not that this was a date. It wasn't. But still.

"I would have chosen someplace... else... but I wanted us to have privacy - to talk! - which meant none of the usual wizarding places, and since I'm taking you out to thank you with that assignment and the paperwork you helped me complete over this last month, I thought this better than a pub or... or..." What did Muggles call those places with the takeaway chips and cheap hamburgers? "A quick food place."

Merlin's bloody balls, _what was happening to him?!_ He'd dated several witches since the war, and three before, and he'd never been this knotted up inside over it, this unsure, this... insecure in his standing.

Not that this was a date. It wasn't. But still.

"No, no, this is perfect! I like it. It looks like the sort of place one might go on a date. Not that I can remember what it's like to date!" She laughed, as if the idea of dating were utterly absurd. "But it's really lovely, Draco. It's fun to try new places. Shall we look over the menu?"

There was one on the table already. They reached for it at the same time. His fingertips brushed hers and she immediately pulled back.

"Sorry, you look first. I already glanced it over, when I first came in."

"No, you first."

Ladies first, always. His father taught him that when he was twelve, back when the man was an impressive specimen with no shortage of interested witches buzzing around him like flies on dung every time he went out in public without his wife. His father used to give him a lot of advice, too much, really, about how to attract and keep and please a woman, sharing tips that "always" worked. At the time, Draco had secretly found it funny. How could these tricks "always" work when the only witch the man had ever had to attract and keep and please was his wife of twenty years? But somewhere around age fourteen Draco realized his mother wasn't the only woman the Malfoy patriarch was frequently pawing. At the time, this had instilled in him a sense of awe and jealousy - he was struggling to find the perfect date for the Yule Ball while his father could have any woman he wanted! - but by sixteen it disgusted him to think of his father cheating on his mother... and now he wondered whether his father regretted that prior infidelity, as Narcissa liked to remind Lucius of it whenever he complained about her going out with male 'friends.'

"I've never had rack of lamb. Would you like to share it?" asked Hermione. "We could get something to share for a starter, too. This place has one fixed price for the entire menu and you choose one option from each course..."

He wondered if she wanted to share food because she was worried about cost, or because she was worried about her figure, or because she just wasn't that hungry or wasn't a fan of the cuisine, but he didn't want to make things even more uncomfortable by asking, so he simply said, "The lamb is one of their best dishes here. How do you feel about mussels?"

She opened her mouth to answer, but there was the waiter, ready to take their drink orders.

"Sedlescombe 2011 Regent red, a bottle," said Draco.

"Water," said Hermione.

"Water?" asked Draco. Was he an imbecile to order the wine? Was that presumptuous? Rude? Did modern, progressive witches dislike it when wizards ordered for them on dates?

Not that this was a date.

It wasn't.

But still.

"I'm a lightweight, that's all." She giggled apologetically. "If I drink nothing but wine all through dinner, you'll have to carry me out of here!"

 _Wouldn't mind that,_ he thought, but he smiled. _Get it together, Malfoy!_ "Ah, yes, of course. Water for me, too. With the wine."

"The bottle?"

"The bottle."

"Excellent choice. I'll return momentarily with your wine and to take your order."

"Honestly, I feel out of my league here," confided Hermione once the waiter had hurried away. "Do you old-line purebloods dine like this all the time?"

She said 'purebloods' with a smile, but the word stabbed him straight through the center of his chest. Would he never escape the stigma of having been a Death Eater, inducted into a madman's inner circle at barely sixteen? Would she ever see completely beyond the boy he'd been before that, the one who mocked her mercilessly and looked down on her for being Muggle-born? Would she ever forget how he regarded her with jealousy and derision and, at times, outright hatred?

"I'm sorry, Draco!" She reached across the table to place one of her soft, small hands on top of his. "I was only teasing! I hope I didn't hurt your feelings."

"What? Of course not!" He laughed it off. Convincingly, he hoped. "My family used to eat here often, when Father had business dealings with Muggles. Mother and I would come along, and the other men typically brought their families as well, but it's been a long time."

"How _are_ your parents?" Her hand was still on his and her eyes were full of sympathy. Surely she knew there were problems at home. The entire wizarding world knew it, thanks to the Society editor's obsession with Narcissa's blossomed social life.

"Doing well," he lied. "Mother is in France, on holiday, while Father manages things at Malfoy Manor." This was not the dinner discussion he'd been hoping to have. Thankfully the waiter's quick return saved him from having to say more.

Soon enough they had their wine and mussels and were awaiting their lamb, and conversation was flowing more easily. They talked about work and the weather and whether the Holyhead Harpies were going to make it into the next Quidditch World Cup, and neither brought up his fucked up parents or her still-recovering-from-Obliviation parents or his friends Blaise and Goyle or her friends Harry and Ron and by the time they were ordering a chocolate souffle to share, Draco was convinced the date was not only going well, but was, in fact, a _date._

"I'm really glad we've gotten to know each other so well over the last couple of years, Draco." She smiled at him across the table, and his heart fluttered stupidly in response. "You're nothing like the boy you used to be."

"Times change, and so do people," he said, immediately giving himself a mental back-pat for it. "For the better, I hope."

"For the better, no question!" She reached out and took his hand again.

And then she said the worst possible thing a witch could say to a wizard under such circumstances.

"I wouldn't trade our friendship for all the galleons in Gringotts!"

* * *

 **A/N:**

Thanks for reading, reviewing, following, and adding to faves!

To clarify, I do plan to head-hop a bit between Lucius and Draco in this fic without sectioning off into individual scenes so I can show what both are thinking/feeling within the same moments without rehashing, but I'll try to keep it from being too confusing. Let me know if I'm failing in that and I'll take another approach.

Please let me know your reactions! As I've said before when writing other fics, I am but a noble niffler and reviews are my favorite shiny objects.

 **-AL**


	3. Chapter 3

**CHAPTER THREE**

 ** _"_** ** _Old friend, why are you so shy_**  
 ** _Ain't like you to hold back_**  
 _ **Or hide from the light...**_ _ **"  
**_ ** _-Adele_**

"You look dreadful and smell worse."

"Go away."

"Away? After I came all the way here at the behest of your son, who bothered me at my place of employment on no less than six separate occasions within the last two weeks alone?" Severus Snape had very little patience at the present, especially as far as Lucius Malfoy was concerned. "Tell me, old friend. Did Narcissa take your bollocks with you when she left?" He sniffed the air. "And the shampoo?"

"You're one to speak of shampoo, Snape. I don't believe you even knew what it was until you got to Hogwarts." Lucius was in bed, under the covers, wearing a nightshirt. At four-thirty in the afternoon.

"My mother used to wash my hair with soap and cold water in the kitchen basin. One of many downsides to a home without modern plumbing. In case you're curious, there are no upsides."

"Your home would still be without modern plumbing had I not paid to have it renovated in '84, so I'll thank you to hold your tongue when you feel the need to criticize my hygiene." Lucius stuck his nose in the air as he spoke, but failed to create an air of superiority on account of the fact that three days worth of soup and stew stains were splashed across his chest, he hadn't shaved in at least two weeks, and his eyes were red-rimmed from excessive drinking.

"Even as a child, in the dead of winter without running water, I managed to bathe myself and launder my clothes more frequently than you have as of late." Severus drew back the blankets, leaving them pooled on the floor at the end of the bed. "Do you suppose this will win her back? Wallow in self-pity if you must, but to wallow in your own..."

"You act as though I don't get out of bed to use the toilet, old friend. Rest assured, I have not been peeing the bed like a toddler. I am capable of rising, walking, washing my hands, and returning to my pillows."

"You are not, however, capable of getting your food from your bowl to your mouth without a brief detour." Severus gestured toward the stains. "Have you no shred of self-worth left, Malfoy?"

"You're one to speak of self-worth, Snape."

"At least I care enough to properly clothe myself." He was dressed, as usual, in a black shirt and black trousers, black frock coat, black boots. "And what is this?" He reached down to tug on the pink silk material peeking out from under the top sheet. "Narcissa's nightgown? Or have you taken to cross-dressing when left to your own devices?"

"Give that here!" Lucius snatched it away. Yes, it was Narcissa's nightgown. The only one he'd managed to keep the house-elves from washing, making it the only one that still smelled of her. She wore a light, flowery perfume that she spritzed on every morning before leaving the Manor, and every evening after her bath, as she wanted to smell pretty both out in public, and alone in her dreams (her words, not his). He supposed he could owl away for a bottle of the perfume, but that somehow seemed even more pathetic than sniffing what lingered in the bodice of her nightgown. He shoved it under his pillow.

"Get up. Shower. Dress. We're going to lunch."

"It's nearly five."

"Dinner, then."

"I'm not hungry."

"Get up." Severus waved his wand lazily, sending a stream of freezing cold water from the tip to the top of Lucius' head.

"Salazar's sins, Severus!" the blond jumped, became entangled in the sheets, and fell off the side of the bed. He quickly scrambled to his feet and tugged down the hem of his nightshirt, trying to maintain some semblance of dignity, but it was a lost cause.

"I could wash you in here, if you prefer. What's that bubble bath charm? We could turn your entire bedroom into a tub."

"I'm not taking a bubble bath with you." Lucius sneered at his friend. _Former_ friend. No friend would come over like this to kick him while he's down.

"You'd prefer a shower? Very well." Severus began unbuttoning his frock coat. "But I'll have you know, I've never co-showered with a man before. Do we take turns under the spigot?"

"I am not showering with you!"

"Then, by all means..." Severus waved his wand again, and the door to the adjoining master bath opened. "Tackle the chore on your own."

While Lucius muttered a number of expletives popular with aristocratic purebloods and stomped off toward the toilet, Severus, smiling, rebuttoned his coat and sat on the little poof stool by the vanity Narcissa left behind. Of course he hadn't any intention of hopping into the shower with his longtime friend - they weren't that close, frankly - but he was pleased as punch to see the tactic work so well.

The feeling of satisfaction was short-lived, however, as Lucius emerged from the loo twenty minutes later wearing another nightshirt. This one was clean, thank Merlin, but it was clear he would not be readily consenting to joining the potions-master for dinner.

"Do I have to dress you?" asked Severus. "I'm not a father, mind, and I don't recall ever being cared for by my own, but I am certain it cannot be that difficult. Arms up, I'll pull the shirt over your head, then we can find you a pair of trousers. Or would you prefer to wear something of Narcissa's?"

"I'm not going out."

"Not like that, you're not. Come on, now." Severus flicked his wand and Lucius' nightshirt disappeared, leaving him only in a pair of silk undershorts with an intricate LM embroidered across the front. "In case you forget your initials?" asked Severus, gesturing. "Or in case the witch you're entertaining has?"

"I haven't entertained a witch in ages," snapped Lucius irritably. Realizing, perhaps, that he was fighting a losing battle, he stalked over to his wardrobe and found a suitable outfit for an early evening supper.

"No? I'm shocked."

"You thought I'd jump into bed with the first attatractive woman who came along after my wife left?"

"You had no qualms about jumping into bed with a number of attractive women while your wife was still here."

Lucius scowled. His friend was right, of course, but he no longer saw that as a source of bragging rights. Quite the opposite. "Those women were mistakes."

"All of them?"

"Every one. I'd feed each one to a rabid, starving werewolf without a moment's hesitation if it meant getting my wife back."

Severus gave a most undignified snort at this. "Seems a bit unfair, no? Just because they had the misfortunate of falling into bed with a man who saw them as nothing more than tits and arses, they should be fed to werewolves?"

"Some of them had decent personalities." Lucius pulled on a pair of dark gray trousers, his back to Severus, then reached for his favorite white shirt, the one with the attached dragon-skin vest. If he was going to venture out in public, he might as well do so looking as though he had managed to hold onto at least a little of his family's money after the war. No need to give the impression of destitution, should the Prophet catch wind of his (hopefully brief) foray back into the public eye.

"Which ones?"

"Which ones what?"

"Had decent personalities."

"Oh. There was... the little ginger with the ring in her nose. She was a capable conversationalist."

"What did you and she like to talk about?"

"I don't know!" Now properly clothed, he twisted on his heel to stare down Severus, who was seated again on the poof. "We talked about how much she enjoyed having my cock in her mouth. How should I remember? It was a decade ago!"

"A decade?" Severus cocked an eyebrow. "Hardly." He remembered the little ginger with the ring in her nose. She was a Snatcher. Cute. Young. Athletic. Ambitious. "Were you with her while the Dark Lord was living here?"

"No." Lucius rummaged in his bedside table for his drawstring bag, the one in which he kept his galleons along with a little 'just in case' Muggle money. "She and I were long over by then."

Severus did not know of his friend's impotence, nor would he, provided Narcissa didn't reveal it for some reason. Jupiter knows Lucius certainly wasn't going to offer up the information.

That little ginger with the ring in her nose had been Lucius' last affair, though which had occurred much more recently than a decade past. He'd been fucking her semi-regularly starting from the night he met her at the Quidditch World Cup, summer of 1994, until he was arrested at the Ministry of Magic and sent to Azkaban in June of '96. Narcissa had known, having caught them in various states of undress in both the library (twice) and the pool house. She hadn't been happy about it, but he assured her it was only sex, nothing more, and that she was the only woman he'd ever loved. She'd seemingly accepted this, and not brought it up again.

Until the day she left, that is, when she told him if he couldn't get it up for her, perhaps he should call upon the ginger bitch, and then informed him she'd be staying with interim Minister for Magic Kingsley Shacklebolt at the Minister's Official Residence until she found a place of her own. Which she did, shortly thereafter, at which time she broke things off with the pureblood former Auror and started fucking a revolving door of handsome, well-known younger men instead.

Severus took Lucius to dinner at a new somewhat upscale little place in Hogsmeade, explaining that he'd have to return to Hogwarts immediately afterward, as he had two students serving detention starting at 8 sharp.

"I cannot for the life of me understand why you returned there," said Lucius as they dug into their starters. "You hated every minute of it as a student and every minute as a professor and every minute as a Headmaster, and now..."

"Minerva needed a Deputy Headmaster and a Defense Against the Dark Arts instructor. No one else would do it. How could I say no?"

"By pressing your tongue to the roof of your mouth to make the 'nn' sound, followed by turning your mouth into an O and breathing out. Try it with me. Nnn-ohhh."

"Amusing." Severus maneuvered a mussel from its shell, swirled it in the garlic sauce, and popped it in his mouth. "But we're not here tonight to discuss my issues. I know I have them and I know what they are. What about you? You cannot cry over her forever."

"I haven't been crying."

"Haven't you?"

Severus' dark eyes met Lucius' blue ones. Neither blinked for a long moment, but it was Lucius who looked away first.

"I forget, sometimes, that you're a Legilimens," he said. "Fine. I've cried. But you can't tell me you haven't. Your darling Mudblood died twenty years ago, and you still pine for her..."

"I do not _pine for her_." Severus' tone was one of warning. Usually Lucius knew better than to bring up Lily... and better than to call her a Mudblood - or use the word at all, really - when in his presence. The man was trying to goad him into an argument, presumably, or maybe it was merely a deflection tactic to avoid discussing his own heartbreak. "I have lived with deep-seated self-loathing and guilt over having gotten her killed. As a child, she was my first and only friend, and living with the knowledge that I was the reason for her death is all-consuming, but I am not pining for her, I am not in love with her, and I am not wallowing away in my bed sniffing her old nightgown, wondering why she won't come back to me."

"My father once said once wives have finished producing children, they've lost their usefulness, but divorce is indecent thus it is imperative to keep a mistress, and keep her well, as scandals do the family no good."

"Is he wrong?" Another mussel liberated from its shell. Swirl. Chew.

"I thought the advice was sound then, but it sounds vulgar now." Lucius poked at his pressed foie gras with his fork, but he had little appetite despite how incredible the few bites he'd had tasted. "I should have treated her better."

"Yes, you should have. But you didn't and she's gone. Your late sister-in-law once told my mother, 'the best way to get over one wizard is to get under another.' Perhaps 'another' is what you need. Just to find yourself again. And, if you can manage that, you might even succeed in enticing your wife back into your bedroom."

Lucius placed his fork beside his plate and leaned forward as if he must not have heard the man correctly, even though their table was small, the restaurant was not loud, and it did indeed sound like something Bellatrix would have believed.

"She said this to your _mother?_ On what occasion?"

"When I was fourteen. My father had recently passed - good riddance to bad rubbish - and we were at a party at the Lestranges. You were there. As a matter of fact, I believe it was your engagement party. Everyone who was anyone who supported the Dark Lord was there. We shouldn't have been, really, but my mother was doing work for him to make extra money, brewing potions and allowing Death Eaters to use our home as a hideaway on occasion, a place to stop over and regroup before disappearing underground once the Ministry was on their tails, so I believe he had the Blacks invite us to be polite." Severus shook his head at the sheer madness of it, that monster being concerned with societal etiquette. The years leaning up to the thick of the first war were quite unlike the months leading up to the second.

"You were thirteen, making Bella... twenty-three? Thereabouts? A newlywed herself; she and Rodolphus were married less than a year before Narcissa and I. Andromeda was already off with her Muggleborn at that time. Pregnant, if I'm not mistaken."

"Yes," Severus confirmed. It had been quite the stuff of scandals in their circle when the middle Black sister announced the was expecting a child out of wedlock with a Muggleborn wizard she'd been secretly seeing for years. She was promptly disowned and, as far as Severus and Lucius were aware, never had any further contact with either of her sisters or their now-deceased parents. Severus continued.

"I stood along the wall and eavesdropped. No one paid me any mind. Why would they? An awkward, ugly adolescent, a nobody. No one registered I was in the room. Mother was uncomfortable. Even without Legilimency, I could discern this from across the room. She and my father had a complicated relationship, as you are aware, and after he died she wanted nothing more than to hide from the world the fact that she'd been with a Muggle. Not even a Muggleborn, but a Muggle. The Dark Lord knew, of course. She begged forgiveness and, presumably because he needed to potions she could provide, he gave it. Bellatrix, not knowing my blood-status at the time, told my mother she was sorry for her loss. She added, 'You know, they say the best way to get over one wizard is to get under another,' and my mother actually laughed. I couldn't recall the last time I'd seen her laugh." Severus's face contorted into an expression of combined disgust and dismay. "Mother was fond of Bellatrix. Found her amusing, she said. Envied her independent nature and the way she worked to get what she wanted."

"I loathed her."

"As did I."

"That's one witch I wouldn't have minded having under me, though." Lucius finally took another bite of his food. It was still good, despite having sat neglected for awhile.

"She wasn't bad."

"You had her?" Lucius' blue eyes widened with genuine surprise. In all the years they'd known each other, since Hogwarts, his friend had never mentioned this.

"I believe it is more accurate to say she had me. But yes. Though it is a story for another time."

Their main courses were being delivered. Lucius allowed them to take the foie gras, assuring the worried waiter it had been up to par despite how little he'd consumed. The mussels, on the other hand, were gone. They had selected the same entree, the dover sole. This, too, smelled amazing. Lucius willed himself to try a bite. Delicious.

"It's not that you have to hop into bed with another witch," said Severus as he tucked into his fish. "But you could rejoin the land of the living, so to speak. Have dinner out. With me, with Draco, by yourself, even. Shop. You love to shop. Find a charity to which you can make a financial contribution; you know better than anyone if it's large enough they'll invite you to a banquet and honor you in front of the press. Correct me if I'm wrong, but before the war, these were among your favorite past times. Hell, you might even get involved in a charity, get your hands dirty..." Severus glanced down at the man's hands, and, remembering the state in which he'd found him earlier, amended the advice. "Figuratively speaking. You might surprise yourself by enjoying it. You were once a social being, dragging me out of the confines of my home and comfort zone to interact with others, as you assumed me humans are not meant to be solitary creatures, remember?"

"I remember." Lucius sighed into his wine goblet before taking a sip. Severus had a point, he supposed, even if he didn't want to hear it. He certainly wasn't going to end up with Narcissa - or any other woman - while home feeling sorry for himself, sitting under stained sheets while lamenting his ruined life into his estranged wife's sweet smelling nightgown.

"Promise you'll consider it?" asked Severus.

"Consider getting involved in a charity on the ground level?"

Severus nodded.

"I..." What did he have to lose? There was nothing left. "Yes. I'll consider it."

* * *

 **A/N:**

Thanks for reading, reviewing, following, and adding to faves!

Maybe I should have mentioned it earlier, but I tend to lean toward the slow-burn side of romance writing, especially as I am a character-driven-fic sort of writer. I hope no one is getting annoyed by this! I promise, there will be a little more 'action' in chapters 4 and 5! :)

 **-AL**


	4. Chapter 4

**CHAPTER FOUR**

 _ **"**_ _ **We were born and raised**_  
 _ **In a summer haze bound by the surprise**_  
 ** _Of our glory days_** ** _..."_** **  
** ** _-Adele_**

Draco was in the mood for some fun. He didn't have many confidants any more, not since the war, but with coworker Hermione's encouragement he was trying to forge more friendships with those around them, which is what led to inviting everyone from both their department (Magical Accidents and Catastrophes) and the Auror training program under the age of twenty-one to Malfoy Manor for a late dinner and a swim. His father would be out for at least awhile, thanks to Snape, and hopefully would go straight to bed upon his return, thus have no idea his home was full of young people seeking a good time.

While there were a few declines, after Hermione convinced Harry to come, others followed suit, and soon enough he had YES RSVPs from Cho Chang, Dean Thomas, Parvati Patil, Angelina Johnson, and Oliver Rivers, in addition to fellow former Slytherins Daphne and Astoria Greengrass, Blaise Zabini, and Gregory Goyle (Goyle didn't work for the Ministry, but as Draco's only friend who didn't abandon him immediately post-war, he deserved an invite).

There was some awkwardness at dinner. Draco had a house-elf set them up at a lovely ivory picnic table in the center of the greenhouse, not only to further ensure they'd avoid his father, but because some of those in attendance did not have fond memories of Malfoy Manor (namely Hermione, Harry, and Dean). People made small-talk until the meal was served, then they had to figure out where to sit without it seeming like anyone was trying to actively avoid sitting beside anyone else. Harry and Parvati had ended up on either side of Hermione, much to Draco's disappointment, as he found himself sandwiched between Zabini and Goyle, but he wasn't going to complain.

The tension dissipated over a delicious dinner, and by the end they were all engaged in one big conversation about the Prophet's recent article in which they revealed that Hagrid was set to marry Madam Maxime.

"I don't mean to be unkind," said Cho carefully. "But can you imagine how big any baby of theirs is going to be? I hope Madam Maxime plans to stay home with it, because I can't see a nanny or nurse being able to carry it around at feeding time!"

"Good he's marrying her, though," said Dean, grinning at Cho (his new girlfriend). "Can you imagine if he married someone else? Say, Professor Sprout, maybe? Having his baby would kill her!"

Every sniggered, even Harry, Hagrid's biggest fan.

After pudding, they took turns going into the small toilet nearest to the sunroom to change. The girls went together in groups, but the boys were not quite so bold, despite having changed in front of each other in shared dormitories and Quidditch locker rooms in the past.

Once all were dressed in their bathing costumes, they headed back into the sunroom.

As always when there were Malfoy Manor pool parties of both males and females, the males made their way into the water first, doing canonballs and dives and generally showing off, while the females either pretended not to notice or said "Ohh, don't splash me!" but didn't move away from the edge of the pool. Draco, when he was little, used to hide in the greenhouse 'tunnel' to spy on his parents' pool parties, and it was the same even with adults in their thirties and beyond. Sometimes those parties got a little... confusing... and though young Draco had been more disgusted than curious, twenty-year-old Draco wouldn't mind experiencing a little of that lifestyle.

He laughed and splashed and nearly drowned from laughing too hard while in the deep end during Beasts of Circe, a rousing game in which one person is rendered unable to see (either by magic or by closing their eyes and being trusted by other players) and has to catch other players in the pool. Other players call out "Circe, here Circe!" and the IT person uses his or her other senses to catch them. Each one caught becomes a Beast of Circe, set on making the game harder for the IT person, who had to catch everyone before his or her turn is up. When he heard Hermione giggle to his left, he leapt in that direction, catching and tickling her as she shouted, "You got me, you got me, I'm a beast!" (He pretended not to hear her the first time she said it.)

An hour later, everyone was breathless and relaxed, and it was almost hard to believe so many of them had literally seen others as enemies just a few days shy of three years before.

Meanwhile, in Hogsmeade...

After dinner, Severus bid his friend adieu and headed up the hill along the path to the castle. Lucius puttered around the little wizarding village for a spell - it did feel good to get out - but when night started to fall, he decided to apparate back to Malfoy Manor.

He arrived at the apparition point beyond the gates and was annoyed to see the gate ajar. One of the peacocks could have escaped! He would have to speak with Draco about his bloody carelessness.

Despite his annoyance, upon fastening it and doing a peacock 'head count' to ensure all were where they should be, he meandered slowly up the walk to the ornate front door. Perhaps Severus was right about him finding another witch. Not one to love. He'd never love another as he loved his Narcissa. And not to shag, since he couldn't seem to manage... _that..._ at the moment. But one to take his mind off things. One to be seen with around Diagon Alley. One who'd let him lick between her legs every now and again... one of his favorite pastimes, which, though he was good at it, ultimately hadn't been enough to keep his wife satisfied. Though he wouldn't ask for reciprocity for obvious reasons, tasting someone knew was always its own excitement, and could be worth working toward.

He inwardly chastened himself for having such vulgar thoughts, blaming them on Severus.

The man had offered to bloody _shower_ with him. How much had Draco paid him to promise to get the man out of bed and out to dinner? Surely Severus wouldn't make such a suggestion without reason. His lip curled into something that resembled a smile as he imagined the look of shock that would have painted itself across the reserved and conservative man had he agreed to take him up on the offer.

"Why yes, Severus, a bubble bath for two sounds most relaxing. I'd love to. You draw the water, I'll find the scented candles."

He snorted. It was a strange sound. Almost like a laugh. He hadn't laughed in... he couldn't remember how long. It felt foreign, but in a good way. He needed to learn to laugh again.

With a sigh, Lucius glanced up at the stars twinkling in the sky above. Night had fallen, and it was a beautiful, clear night at that. No clouds, full moon. Saturn could be seen far off, along with several constellations he vaguely remembered learning the names of back in the Astronomy tower at Hogwarts.

That was where he'd first kissed Narcissa.

They hadn't sneaked up there in the middle of the night, long past curfew, to fondle each other under their uniforms while listening for Filch approaching like so many other students. He had far too much class for that, and she had too much self-respect.

No, it had been after class one night, fifth year. She'd forgotten her textbook. He'd offered to run back up for it.

 _"Wait here," said Lucius, as they reached the first landing. "I'll be right back."_

 _"But we'll be late returning to the dorms," she said, looking worried. "Professor Slughorn will give us detention if we get caught."_

 _"You're safe with me," Lucius assured her. "I won't let you get detention. I'm a prefect, remember?"_

 _She smiled and said thank you. He glanced back once before turning the corner - well, not quite a corner, since the staircase was spiral, but once more before she'd be out of sight. She stood there on the stairs in her gray skirt and green scarf and shiny black patent leather shoes, hugging her bag to her chest, smiling hopefully up at him with huge blue eyes and the silkiest hair he'd ever seen, including his own. He took the stairs two at a time to retrieve her book, apologizing to Professor Sinistra for the interruption (she was still stargazing) but he came down more slowly, as he didn't want them to meet up with the rest of the class if the walked too quickly. He'd rather have her all to himself._

 _"Thanks so much!" She took the book from him and slipped it in her bag, and their fingers brushed as she did so._

 _"I'll carry your bag," he offered, reaching for it. Their fingers brushed again as she released it to him._

 _"You're very kind, Lucius."_

 _"You're lovely," he replied, and he instantly wanted to kick himself for being so bloody forward, but she shot him another shy smile in response. Her cheeks even went a little pink. He knew other boys talked about how stuck-up and snobbish she was, how arrogant like her older sisters, but he thought they were reading her all wrong._

 _"You're awfully quiet," she said, as they made their way down the stairs side by side. "Tired?"_

 _"No!" He took a deep breath, steadying himself. "Narcissa, w_ _ill you attend the Yule Ball with me?"_

 _"With you?" Her shy smile grew, which lit up her entire face. "I'd love to!"_

 _"I... I like you." He stopped walking so she did the same. When she wasn't around, he was as confident as those sisters of hers. No, more so. He was downright pompous. But her in presence, he was humbled. "But you don't have to say yes unless you really want to."_

 _"Lucius, I like you, too." She leaned forward, closed her eyes, and pressed her lips gently - and briefly - to his. "I'd love to go to the ball with you."_

Lucius exhaled slowly and sat on a marble bench. He glanced around. How had he ended up in the garden? Wandering, he supposed. Wandering while thinking about her.

 _She was beautiful. She'd always been beautiful. Though it had taken him until midway through fourth year to actually spark up a conversation with her, he'd fallen in love on the train on the first of September at age eleven._

 _"Who's that?" he asked his friend Thorfinn, who'd boarded beside him, as they looked for an empty car. She was standing down the hall between two dark-haired older girls wearing matching sneers, but she'd spotted him and smiled for a second._

 _"Narcissa Black, you know her. Her mother used to bring her around, until they lost the boy and she became a recluse. Don't you know nothing?"_

 _"That can't be Narcissa Black!" Lucius insisted. The Narcissa Black he remembered was about six-years-old with curly blonde pigtails, frilly dresses, ruddy cheeks, and several missing teeth. That Narcissa Black had a bad habit of twirling her hair around her forefinger and whining at her mummy. There was no way this girl could be the same. She was delicate, graceful, kind-eyed..._

 _She was the first girl he'd ever_ noticed.

 _"That's her," said Thorfinn. "Mother takes us to visit them sometimes because they've been friends since Hogwarts, but Mrs. Black never leaves their country house."_

Six years later, when he told his parents he intended to marry Narcissa Black upon finishing their education, Abraxas and Beryl Malfoy had mixed reactions. His father approved because she was attractive and pureblood, a virgin (or so he was told), wealthy, and of good breeding. His mother was less enthused, as she was worried that Mrs. Druella Black's agoraphobia might be hereditary and she wasn't keen on having a daughter-in-law who'd refuse to thrive in social settings and make her presence known among the upper-crust in their world. But he'd invited her and her mother over for tea with his mother, parental grandmother, and maternal aunt, and by some "miracle" Narcissa was able to convince her mother to attend (leaving the house for the first time in fifteen years), and the women of his family had been utterly enchanted by both women.

Later he learned they hadn't had tea with Druella at all, but with Bellatrix, who knew how to brew a batch of Polyjuice Potion and was quite the actress, but it didn't matter. The marriage had been approved.

Lucius sat outside for over an hour despite the chill in the April air. He considered performing a warming charm, but, honestly, it felt good to _feel._ He spent most of the time waffling back and forth between thinking up reasons to win Narcissa back, and thinking up ways to help himself let her go.

Severus was right, though. No matter what happened, he wasn't going to get anywhere confined to his too-large bed, staring at his pathetic reflection in the ceiling mirror, and sniffing her nightgown.

Even if he couldn't land himself another woman, he could, at the very least, start looking.

Not that finding a woman ought to be his ultimate goal. Cliched as it sounded, finding himself again would be more important.

But having a witch by his side for the journey wouldn't hurt.

He sighed, stood, and stretched. It was getting late. Time to head in. Maybe he'd take another shower. He hadn't been able to relax in the last one, not knowing Severus bloody Snape was standing just outside the door, waiting. And judging.

He had no sooner exited the garden when he heard the tinkling of laughter coming from the sunroom beyond the Wiggentree Narcissa planted just after the end of the first war, when Harry Potter survived the killing curse and the Dark Lord disappeared.

No lanterns or lamps were lit in the large, slope-roofed sunroom off the back of Malfoy Manor beyond the garden, but there were definitely people out there. He heard another giggle. Feminine. Could it be Narcissa? But what would she be doing back, especially at this hour, and in the sunroom? While it would be just like her to go for a moonlight swim in the heated in-ground pool (magic was truly a beautiful thing) she certainly hadn't had any interest in doing so at their home in some time.

Rather than going through the Manor to the interior entrance, he cut back through the garden and greenhouse, where an above ground 'tunnel' connected the two glass buildings. There was, indeed, a woman in the pool, but her hair was brown, and her skin was tan, and she was certainly not his Narcissa.

"Is anyone thirsty?" asked a familiar voice - Draco - standing with his back to Lucius. His swim trunks were dripping all over the floor. Lucius frowned. His son knew better than to track water beyond the subtly heated cemented surrounding the pool, as it warped the wood of of the floors. He opened his mouth to say something, but several other voices spoke over his quite, "Son."

"I'd love a butterbeer!" called another familiar voice, that of Blaise Zabini.

"Butterbeer for me, too," said a girl's voice. He tried to remember where he'd heard it before. "And one for Daphne, too, please."

Oh, Daphne must be Daphne Greengrass, and the speaker must be her sister, Astoria. He'd known their father since they were babies, having served on the Hogwarts Board of Governors and on several philanthropic committees together when both were trying to repair their reputations after the first fall of Voldemort. Astoria sounded just like her mother.

"You too, Harry?" asked Draco, and Lucius blanched. Harry? Harry who? Not...

"Thanks, yeah."

Potter?

Harry Potter was here using his pool?

Lucius rubbed his temples, closed his eyes, and counted to twenty. Had he hit his head while out on the bench? Had Severus slipped something into his drink at dinner? Surely he was hallucinating. He knew his son was on speaking terms with two of the three members of the so-called Golden Trio, since they worked together at the Ministry, but this was a bit... much.

"I'll be right back." Draco stepped out of view, just inside the house, still dripping wet, presumably to call for Zippy or Dippa or whatever other house-elf remained after Narcissa took half of them to her new home.

Lucius stepped into the moonlight, set to call for his son and demand to know why his home was occupied by at least a dozen teenagers and twenty-somethings, when the brunette he'd spotted first pulled herself from the pool. She had her back to him and he couldn't help letting his gaze travel down over her pert arse and thin legs, to her small feet, and back up past the white string of her bikini top to slender shoulders as she wrung out her hair. She seemed to sense his presence because she froze momentarily before whipping around to face him.

"Oh, Mr. Malfoy, it's you." She smiled. She had a nice smile. Straight, white teeth. Brown eyes that almost looked gold in the light of the full moon. A tiny nose. Thick brows. Soft looking skin. "I hope we didn't wake you."

"Er... uh..." He cleared his throat, scolding himself for being taken by her appearance, as if he'd never seen perky breasts and a flat abdomen and long hair and kissable lips before. "No, I was awake. I'm just returning home. I was out to dinner with..." Fuck, he didn't want to tell her - them! - no, her - that he'd been out on a dinner date with Snape. "With an old friend. I heard the noise and came to investigate, but I see now my son is having a gathering, so I'll go."

"You don't have to go," she said, stepping forward. Behind her, the others chatted and laughed and splashed in the water, paying him no mind. "Draco will be happy to see you out of your room." She clapped her hands over her mouth. Clearly she hadn't meant to reveal that Draco had shared with her his father's reclusive present condition. "I'm sorry, sir. I meant no disrespect."

"Please, worry not, having you here in my home is no imposition." Did that sound too formal? 'Worry not'? Maybe it sounded too formal. How did young people talk nowadays, anyway?

"Butterbeers for all except Dean, because he's on a diet," said Draco, reentering with a teasing grin on his face. He started tossing out bottles to his friends.

"You all laugh now," said a tall black boy who must be Dean. "But when I'm on the cover of Witch Weekly, you won't be laughing then!"

"I'll still be laughing," said a girl with shoulder-length black hair and a ring in her nose.

"You know you love me, Cho," said Dean. He turned to Draco. "Gillywater?"

"Right here." As Draco was leaning toward the pool to pass in the bottle, he finally caught sight of his father. He released the bottle, straightened, and sent the man a look clearly begging 'don't embarrass me."

"We do not usually allow drinks in the pool," said Lucius. This had always been a rule for Draco and friends, though he and Narcissa had sipped many a cocktail while canoodling on a floating raft. "But you're all adults now. I trust you to be responsible."

"Thank you, Father," said Draco, visibly relaxing. He returned to passing out bottles of butterbeer, but sent several worried looks over his should at Lucius.

"How is Professor Snape?" asked the attractive brunette before him conversationally. Lucius inwardly cringed. Draco must have told her who he'd been out with... or maybe she just assumed he had no other friends. Which was, at the moment, true.

"Quite well." He tried not to let his gaze wander over her again, though part of him wanted to step forward to get a closer look. A white bikini. Awfully bold. He imagined, in better lighting, one could almost see right through it. "I'll leave you young people to your fun." He walked toward the interior door, though it meant passing close by her. He averted his gaze when they were close enough to touch. Narcissa had never worn a white bikini. Of course, she'd had less to put in one.

"Goodnight, Mr. Malfoy," the brunette called after him.

"Goodnight, Miss Granger."

As he got into bed a short time later, he reached for his wife's nightgown out of habit, gave it a quick sniff, and shoved it between the mattress and boxspring. He didn't want to think about her any more tonight. He had someone else on the forefront of his mind.

Miss Granger.

She'd grown up quite nicely, hadn't she?

No longer the uppity little swot he first remembered encountering in the Department of Mysteries five years ago...

And not the war-bedraggled, far-too-skinny, dirty bleeding mess she'd been during the Final Battle...

She seemed to have come into her own. Grown into a woman. Filled out in all the right places.

He was still in love with Narcissa, make no mistake, but Severus _had_ advised him to look at other witches.

And, tonight, he'd certainly been looking.

* * *

 **A/N:**

-The Wiggentree is supposed to repel dark creatures (if one is touching it) and is protected by bowtruckles like Pickett, like the little green guy in Fantastic Beasts.

-Though there is no son of Druella and Cygnus on the tapestry, I'm assuming names are not added immediately after birth, as the portraits of those depicted are not of them as babies, so for the sake of this story they aren't added until they live to be Hogwarts age, at which time it's known whether they have magic, thus if one died before age 11 he or she wouldn't be put on.

-In canon, Lucius was born in late 1953 or early 1954 and Narcissa at some point in 1955, but for the purpose of this fic he was born in later 1954 and she was born in early 1955, putting them in the same year at Hogwarts.

-I hate it in fics when Hermione is suddenly this drop dead gorgeous girl-Adonis (or Helen of Troy type) and in this story, she's NOT that. Lucius sees her as perfect initially because he's attracted to her, the same way he first saw Narcissa, but she's still Hermione, I promise. :)

Thanks for reading and reviewing, following and adding to faves!

 **-AL**


	5. Chapter 5

**CHAPTER FIVE**

 ** _"I hate to turn up out of the blue, uninvited..."_**

 ** _-Adele_**

If there was only one word he could use to describe his mother, it would be "elegant." She carried herself with an air that his father lost to Azkaban and that he'd never quite perfect, though he'd gotten close during his fifth year at Hogwarts. She had perfect posture, her hair was always carefully styled, her nails were long and manicured, her makeup enhanced her natural beauty, the cost of her everyday jewelry surpassed that of some small countries' national net worth, and she only wore the best dresses and dress robes and dressing gowns.

Aside from his six and seventh years in school, when she'd fallen apart almost as completely as his father, she was the very picture of class and a beacon of self-control.

Which is why he was shocked on Saturday morning, when he showed up at her country house to find her wearing dark blue jeans and a too-tight short-sleeved merlot-colored top, her hair hanging limply around her face, a cigarette between her first and second fingers. She had dark circles under her red-rimmed eyes and was leaning against the doorframe as if she'd fall over without it.

"Who are you and what have you done with my mother?"

"Draco, darling, come in."

"Why didn't a house elf get the door? Have you been drinking? You look like shit."

"Language, darling." She kissed his cheek. She was ice cold. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"Mother, let's bypass the formalities. What are you _wearing?"_

She sighed and led the way into the formal parlor, where she retrieved a silver ashtray from atop the fireplace mantle. She flicked ashes into it, pressed her back against the wall, and looked him over for an uncomfortably long time. Knowing precisely what she was doing, he worked to close his mind using the Occlumency skills Aunt Bella taught him the summer before sixth year. After perhaps a minute, she gave up.

"Let's sit."

"Fine." He waited as she positioned herself in one of the antique chairs that had previously been in the Malfoy Manor library. He sat in the other, across from her, in front of the fire. "What are you wearing?"

"It's Muggle attire. Do you like it?"

"Are you dating a Muggle now?"

Her mouth dropped; she was utterly scandalized by the question.

"Of course not! Our family's fall from grace has not been enough to rob me of my core values, and I'm insulted you'd even make the assumption." She took a long drag and let the smoke out slowly. He tried his best to resist the urge to cough over-dramatically, as he had as a boy whenever she did this in front of him. (Cigarette smoking was a habit he hated.)

"Then why do you look like one of those Muggle mothers who go out to the pub to chat up men after spending an entire day watching her four whiny kids kick a black and white ball around a public park?"

"You seem to know more about Muggle mothers, whiny kids, and public parks than I'd have suspected." Another drag. "If you must know, last night a friend and I went out to a... a certain type of establishment... and he requested I try to 'fit in' with 'the locals.' Andromeda lent me this." Vulnerability momentarily flickered across her face. "Does it look terrible?"

"Er..." If he was being honest, though it seemed somewhat trashy, it made her look quite a bit younger than her usual ensembles. This wasn't a change he liked much. (He wondered whether his father would. He hadn't given up hope for a reconciliation.)

"Draco?"

"You look fine."

"My friend seemed to like it, but then he went home with a girl around your age, so who can really tell with men? I returned here long after midnight and drank myself to sleep. I've never been much good with alcohol, as you know... I suppose I forgot to change out of this ridiculous _costume_ first." She said the word as if it tasted dirty.

"You drank yourself to sleep? Should I be worried?"

She ignored his questions.

"To be honest, by that point, my looks wasn't on the forefront of my mind. No, that's not true." She shook her head. The diamonds in her left ear caught the light in just the right way, making them glimmer. "They _were_ at the forefront. But it was more of a 'have I lost my looks?' mantra reverberating around in my head than a, 'Should I change in case Draco stops by shortly after dawn?' one."

She stubbed what was left of the cigarette into the ashtray and Accioed the pack over from across the room. Draco, with his Seeker reflexes, managed to intercept it inches from her outstretched hand.

"They say these will kill you."

She rolled her eyes.

"You know, Mother, just because you and Father have split doesn't mean you need to paint the town with every man who-"

She sat up straighter, suddenly sobered. "Are you calling me a slag, Draco?"

He froze, realizing he was treading on dangerous ground. Again he employed Occlumency. He didn't need his mother - whom he'd come to for dating advice, of all things - to know that he did, indeed, think she was being a bit less discriminatory than he deemed appropriate. He was no prude when it came to sex, nor was he inexperienced, and he appreciated a witch who knew what she liked, but Narcissa was his _mother,_ and the thought of _his mother_ being pawed at by a Quidditch player and the Minister for Magic and two well-known pureblood philanthropists and Blaise Zabini's bloody father was a bit too much for him to handle.

"I was a good wife to your father and a good mother to you. Now that I am not with your father and you are grown, my life is again my own, and I'll thank you not to offer up your opinions regarding the way I chose to live it. Understand?"

"Understood." He tossed the cigarette pack gently in her direction; it landed in her lap. "I'll be going."

"Did you visit just to wake me prematurely, judge me for my attire, and comment on my social life?"

She looked and sounded hurt. His father had mentioned recently that Narcissa mentioned not spending enough time with her son. She'd even been willing to go out to dinner as a family again, if it would entice him to stay a little longer in her company. Lucius had shared this with his son sounding almost hopeful, which only made Draco pity him more. He pitied them both, really. They were no longer the people they'd been in his childhood, and from what he'd been told, they weren't the people they'd been before he was born, either. All three Malfoys had survived the war, yes, but a part of each of them seemed to have died in that Final Battle.

Which is precisely what he'd come to his mother to discuss, as he had no one else to confide in. No one else he'd want to confess this to, at any rate.

"Mother, there's a witch I'm interested in, but she sees us as only friends."

"Oh?" Narcissa cocked an eyebrow and leaned forward. She'd always been a bit of a gossip and a matchmaker, she'd loved setting up her girlfriends with prominent wizards and then helping them dissect every date, every conversation, every intimate encounter, seeking subtext and making assumptions about where the relationship would eventually lead.

"Don't get excited. I'm not going to ask you for ways to woo her or any of that rubbish."

"But you want to know how to transition from friend to lover. Are you hungry? Let's have breakfast." She snapped her fingers. A small female house elf appeared. "Draco wants breakfast. He'll take eggs, sausages, toast, a grilled tomato, those mushrooms I like, and - do you want beans, dear?"

"Just eggs and toast is plenty, really, Mother. And coffee?"

"Coffee?" She screwed up her nose. "I hate the smell, but she'll brew it for you. I'll have tea... just a drop of whisky in that tea."

"Are you a morning drinker like Father now?"

This brought a scowl to her face. "Nix the whisky. Milk is fine. No sugar. I'm watching my figure."

"Yes, Missus Malfoy, right away!" The little elf bowed and disapparated.

"I'm going to take a very quick shower and dress. I'll meet you in the dining room in... fifteen minutes? Twenty at most."

"I... Mother..."

"You'll stay for breakfast." She rose, kissed his forehead, and walked toward the door, only swaying slightly. "I love that you've come to me for advice rather than asking your father."

"Great." He waited until her footsteps disappeared up the stairs to bury his face in his hands. She was far too excited about this conversation, which almost certainly meant coming to her had been a mistake. But who else could he go to with 'girl problems' at the moment?

Not Goyle. He had a reputation to protect, and Goyle was the one person who still looked up to him with awe.

Not Pansy. She was still bitter about their breakup, even though she swore she was fine being "just friends."

Not Blaise. While they were still mates, their friendship had taken a hit when Narcissa cheated on his father with the Quidditch player.

He was getting to know some of Hermione's friends, namely Dean Thomas, but they certainly weren't close enough for a chat like this, especially considering which witch had so thoroughly captured his attention as of late.

Eighteen minutes later, he was tucking into eggs and toast and tomatoes and sausages and mushrooms and beans and bacon (that bloody elf didn't listen worth a damn) with a hot cup of coffee and a glass of pumpkin juice when his mother entered the dining room. Though not fully made up, she looked more like herself, in a long silver and blue embroidered witch's robe with her hair pulled into a low braid. She was wearing four rings, three on one hand, one on the other, none of which were her wedding band.

"You're not divorced yet, you know," he said, his eyes on the ringless third finger of her left hand.

"Draco, please. We're discussing _your_ relationship issues this morning, not mine."

The house elf placed a plate of toast, mushrooms, and tomato in front of her. No eggs, no meat. As far back as Draco could remember, his mother was "watching (her) figure," very much the opposite of his Aunt Bellatrix, who preferred a breakfast of Pop Tarts and Coke, two American Muggle staples his parents hated even having in the home.

("You'll rot your teeth," Narcissa would scold her. "Azkaban already did," Bella'd reply.)

"My tea?" Narcissa asked, surveying what had been put before her. The house elf's eyes grew huge and she hurried from the room, apologizing profusely. She returned a moment later with a tray on which she'd place a steaming mug of tea and a glass of gillywater.

"Thank you," said Draco pointedly. His mother had raised him to be polite to those on equal footing or above him, but not to those considered subservient, like house elves, Muggles, and Weasleys. In his efforts to shed the skin of the boy he'd once been, saying "Please" and "thank you" even to those who literally lived to serve him had become second nature.

"Yes, thank you," said Narcissa, not one to be made to seem classless by comparison, not even in front of her son. "Good elf."

"Misty," Draco said. "The elf's name is Misty. You've had her for twenty years."

"I know her name is Misty," snapped Narcissa. "Thank you for breakfast, Misty. You're a good elf." She patted the little mite on her head, which made her beam. She bowed low and hurried out, practically floating.

"Mother-"

"What's her name? This girl?"

"It's... nothing." CLOSED went his mind, though he could feel her attempts to rifle around in his thoughts. Her Legilimency skills were more fine-tuned than those of his aunt in that she was subtler, less forceful, but when she didn't get the desired results (seeing whatever he was trying to hide) she pushed further, harder, almost to the point of being painful.

"Stop bloody doing that, Mother."

"Language, Draco." She reached for her mug. "You met her at the Ministry? I'm seeing the Ministry."

"Mother!" He dipped a toast point into the runny yolk of his egg. "I wish you wouldn't invade my privacy like that."

"Your privacy?" She chuckled. "You spent the first forty weeks of your life living _inside me_ , how is that for an invasion of privacy?"

"It's not the same." He scowled and took a big bite of sausage.

She sipped at her tea and picked at her toast and waited patiently for him to continue, once he'd swallowed (and gotten over her latest attempt to read him).

"The witch I'm interested in is a friend, and I don't know that she'll ever see me as anything but. Without telling her how I feel or working to woo her, how can I change her perception of me?" He'd carefully phrased and practiced this question at home, as he wished to avoid accidentally revealing Hermione's identity to his mother. He had a feeling she'd be less than supportive. While she was not vocally against mixed relationships, he knew she still expected him to marry a pureblood... or, at the very least, a half-blood. Certainly not the Muggleborn 'brains of the Golden Trio,' the girl who'd been tortured in their drawing room by his mad aunt only two-and-half years back.

Narcissa pondered a moment before responding.

"Have you tried seeing someone else?"

"Excuse me?"

"Nothing ever made me want your father more than when I knew he was seeing someone else," she said simply. "I once caught him fondling a friend of mine in the pool during a party. The very thought of it - the _sight_ of it - drove me wild with jealousy and desire and... well... as soon as she'd left... I jumped on him without even sending a house elf upstairs for the potion first. " Narcissa caught his revolted expression and quickly skipped to the ending. "Approximately nine months later, we had you."

"Ew."

She smiled and squeezed his hand. "My lovely little unplanned miracle."

"Forgive me, Mother, but I need to leave now. I have to make an emergency appointment with an Obliviator."

She laughed and urged him to return to his chair.

"You're an adult now, Draco. While I'll spare you the details, it cannot _possibly_ come as a shock to learn your father was not faithful to me throughout our marriage."

"I don't need to know I only exist because you caught him with his hand over some random witch's bikini top!"

"Not some random witch! It was Euphemia Rowle. You remember her, don't you?"

He nearly retched. He did indeed remember her. She was one of the Dark Lord's most ardent followers, as in love with him as Auntie Bella had been. She and her husband were serving life sentences in Azkaban now.

"Thank you, Mother, but knowing which witch is was does _not_ make me feel better about-"

"Stop it, Draco, darling. I'm trying to help you."

"I don't think it would help me if Her... if _she_ were to witness me snogging one of her friends."

"You don't have to go that far, but if she sees you as desirable to another, she'll see you as desirable in general. Perhaps you could... invite her to dinner, and arrange to have an Owl sent to you midway through. Receive it, unfurl, and apologize. Say it's a letter from a lady friend, be a little coy, say you met her recently and while you enjoy her company, it's overwhelming how very attached she is so early in your courtship, then put the parchment in your front pocket, sticking out just a bit so she can see it, a visual reminder throughout the meal. Say, 'I'm sorry, you were saying?' and move on like it never happened. Brush off any questions she tries to ask; less information will only make her more curious. This will peak her interest, I promise you."

"Does that really work on witches?" He was skeptical, to say the least. He couldn't imagine Hermione as the jealous type... though she had made a couple of very nasty comments under her breath upon seeing a picture of Ron with his girlfriend on the third page of his Quidditch Quarterly last month.

"Let me put it this way, love. Last night, my friend invited me out, lavished attention on me, then met a younger woman and left with her, and my first thought upon waking this morning was, 'How can I win him back?' I don't even enjoy his company all that much, but I'll be damned if he's going to toss me over like that. And with you two being friends, she won't even suspect that your new witch is fabricated for her benefit. Trust Mummy." She scooped what was left of her mushrooms onto his plate. "Eat up, Draco. You're looking peaked."

Approximately a two hour broom ride from Narcissa's new Hertfordshire home, Lucius Malfoy was standing on the doorstep of a modest London flat, wearing Muggle attire and feeling decidedly out of place.

He knocked softly twice, cleared his throat, and knocked again with conviction.

After a few moments, just as he was thinking this was a terrible mistake and he ought to disapparate back to Malfoy Manor post haste, the door swung open.

"Mr. Malfoy!" Hermione Granger's cinnamon brown eyes widened with surprise. She was dressed casually, but of course she was, being it was early Saturday morning. "Uh... if you're looking for Draco, he's not here."

"No, I wasn't." He stood erect, shoulders back, his tied-back hair lightly blowing with the breeze. He was trying to strike a balance between casual and regal, as he both wanted to impress her and was hellbent on ensuring she had no idea he was trying to impress her. "I came to see you."

Her words hit him a millisecond after he'd spoken. Why would she assume he was there to see Draco? Because Draco was their common thread... or because Draco could sometimes be found in her flat early in the morning? He fought the urge to sneer. He had no desire to see his son with this Muggleborn swot.

Himself, on the other hand...

"Um... why?" She did not step back to invite him in, but she wasn't slamming the door in his face either, so that was something.

"A book was left behind at Malfoy Manor." He reached into his pocket, pulled out tome the size of a biscuit, and covertly transfigured it back to rightful size. "It had your name on the inside, under Property Of. I'm afraid it was water damaged. I did my best to fix it, but unfortunately it must have been at the bottom of the pool for at least two days before a house..." He paused, remembering that his son had said she was vocally anti-house elves. "Before I saw it at the bottom of the deeper end and dove in to retrieve it." Y _es, that was much better._ He smiled.

"Oh, my book!" She took it from him, flipped through the warped pages, and sighed. "My all-time favorite, Hogwarts, A History. I've had it since before my first year, since my very first trip to Diagon Alley when I was eleven. I brought it to the party to loan to Cho, as she's working on a dissertation about the UK's most prominent ghosts and poltergeists."

"It just so happens, I have my own copy." He removed it from the same pocket in which he'd held hers, and transfigured it to full-size. "Would you like to lend it to her? I had intended to tell you you could keep it, as I feel it's my fault yours went unnoticed so long."

"Oh, thank you, but you don't have to do that!" She accepted the clean copy, though, and hugged it to her chest.

"I feel I did, considering."

The truth was, he'd discovered her book on a bench by the pool and had waterlogged it himself, then did a shoddy job of the repair just to have an excuse to pay a visit. He was thankful she hadn't remembered it and asked Draco to find it in the interim. Now came the best part of his plan.

"Thank you, sir." She smiled, a smile he readily returned - but he kept his from being too broad.

"As I was saying, I feel dreadfully responsible-"

"Mr. Malfoy, it's really alright-"

"Please." He held up a hand to halt her. "This is not easy for me to say." He let out a long exhale. With feigned humility, he went on. "I feel responsible for the destruction of your property at my home, and also for what you endured when Snatchers brought you to us during the war. As both a proud man and one full with deep, genuine remorse, I have struggled over these last two years with finding a way to apologize that could be even remotely sufficient. While I realize replacing a book you had no idea was even damaged is a poor attempt, I'd be honored if you'd do me the courtesy of a conversation, during which I could begin to make it up to you by offering my assistance with that house elf protection legislation you're drafting, if you're so inclined. I have years of experience with such things through my time as a Hogwarts governor, ten years on the Wizengamot, and half a lifetime of being involved in the inner workings of the Ministry. Perhaps... over brunch?"

"Oh? Oh!" She blinked several times. She'd clearly not been expecting this. He tried to toe the line between being humbly hopeful and avoiding looking overeager, as if it would be no skin off his nose if she said absolutely not.

"Unless... you have other plans this morning?"

"No! I... I have nothing planned. I was going to have coffee and toast for breakfast, but brunch sounds much better. I'll just... I'll put these books in the bedroom and get my coat. And... uh... maybe fix my hair."

"Take all the time you need, Miss Granger."

"Call me Hermione." She finally opened the door fully, stepping back. "Would you like to wait in the sitting room? I'll only be a few minutes."

"Thank you. Bit windy out here." He followed her. The flat was small, with an open kitchen and a sitting room lined with bookshelves that reminded him of Severus' home on Spinner's End. There were two doors off this room, presumably leading to a bedroom and a bath. He settled on one end of the couch and reached for the morning's Daily Prophet on her end table. "Do you mind?"

"Please! I'll... be right back."

He smiled as he thumbed through the pages.

He'd lost many things since his stint in Azkaban, but perhaps his way with the witches wasn't one of them.

* * *

 **A/N:**

Sorry for the delay in updates! Had a crazy month, work-wise. Back on track now. Thanks for reading and reviewing! I hugely appreciate every follow and fave and any/all feedback!

 **-AL**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N**

Fair warning, Lucius is kind of an ass in this chapter. He's also a Slytherin, capable of manipulation, and a man who, in the past, was able to land a woman with ease... but those days are gone. :D That said, before judging Hermione, keep in mind everything is being seen from Lucius' perspective in the first part of this chapter. He presumes to know what she's thinking (what ALL women are thinking, really), but he's no Legilimens.

 **-AL**

* * *

 **CHAPTER SIX**

 ** _"_ Nothing compares, no worries or cares _ **.**.."_**

 ** _-Adele_**

Lucius Abraxas Malfoy was utterly charming. Humble when he needed to be, bordering on over-confident when it suited him, the very pinnacle of class and suavity. He asked all the right questions, reacting appropriately and making frequent eye contact, smiling even when he found her duller than dust mites. He feigned interest in the rights of house elves and her proposed creature protection legislation, and took every possible opportunity to apologize for his past actions without giving the mistaken impression he was begging her forgiveness (because Lucius Malfoy does not beg).

He was damn good, and he knew it.

First, they'd gone to a brunch place near her flat. It was packed full of people, mostly twenty- and thirty-somethings, but he'd known it would be. He's used a lovely little mind manipulation spell taught to him by the Dark Lord himself while en route to her home, which made no less than forty people think, "I need brunch." They'd flocked there.

"Oh, dear," he'd tutted, looking disappointed. "I suggested brunch because I walked by this place on my way to you, but the wait is long. There _is_ another place, one owned by wizards, not far from here, but we would have to apparate." He removed the snake's head of his cane from his pocket, gave it a flick, and it became full-sized. As they turned the corner around the building he removed his wand from his inside front pocket, tipped back the head of the cane, and dropped the wand inside. "It, too, is very busy. Without a reservation, I do not know that we'll be able to get in, but it's worth a go."

"Sure," she'd said good-naturedly.

As expected, it, too, was packed with people.

"Please, give me a moment to converse with the maitre-d," he said. "The Malfoy name no longer comes with as much clout as it once did, but many years ago I was a frequent diner here. I often forced Severus to tag along, simply to get him out of that castle. The poor man, he'd have been such a recluse without me, but as his friend, I could not sit back and let him fall farther into depression."

"That's very kind of you to have thought of him." Her face softened, and he had to hide a smirk. Women love men who care about their kids, their pets, and reclusive, depressed, war-hero friends. Since he knew simply acknowledging the existence of his son wouldn't score points with this particular woman and he wasn't sure how she felt about animal ownership (the same as house-elf ownership?) he thought bringing up Snape would be the best way to remind her of his humanity.

He kept his voice low when speaking to the maitre-d. "Lucius Malfoy, reservation for two. I would appreciate being seated immediately."

"Of course, Mr. Malfoy." The man smiled as Lucius surreptitiously dropped a number of galleons into his palm. "Right this way."

"Hermione?" he called. She came. They sat. They perused the menu, ordered, and commenced conversation.

They were nearly through with the last of their meal when he put on an expression of deep concern and asked, "My son, Draco - how _is_ he faring at the Ministry? I do not meet to put you in an awkward position, Miss Granger, but as a father, I cannot help worrying. His reputation - it's improving? I was pleased to see him enjoying himself at that little pool party. He needs friends. And you _are_ his friend, aren't you?"

"Oh, yes!" She nodded vigorously. She had her elbow on the table and her fork in her hand, dripping egg yolk onto her napkin. Quite unbecoming, quite unlike his wife.

Also quite unlike his wife, she had developed an ample chest since finishing her Hogwarts education. For this, and because he hoped to become better acquainted with her fit little body, he'd forgive her poor table manners.

"Is he, by any chance - and please, do not feel obligated to answer if I am stepping over the line - but is he a... potential paramour?" Catching her look of surprise, he quickly added, "I do not wish to pry into your life, Miss Granger, but I know Draco was devastated by the demise of his relationship with Miss Parkinson at Hogwarts, and he's yet to bring another young lady home."

"No, we're just friends!" She said this cheerfully, moving her fork in the air as she spoke, not looking at all bothered by the inquiry. Good. Had she answered 'just friends' in a defensive or coquettish way, he'd assume there was a spark there, and as interested as he was he had no interest in competing with his own son for a witch. The truth was, Draco had brought many a woman home to Malfoy Manor, but few ever returned for a second go. He did not know whether this was because Draco's attention span was short or whether it was because his techniques were not sufficient to hold their interest. Either way, he didn't much care. So long as the boy wasn't fucking the Mudblood.

"I'm happy to hear it." He placed his hand over hers and caught the way she shivered at his touch, but he got the distinct impression she didn't mind the physical contact. She neither pulled away nor stopped smiling. Excellent. "He needs friends. We all do. These two years since the war ended have not been easy for anyone, have they?"

"No," she confessed, her smile faltering now. "They haven't."

"And that is why I cannot begin to fully express my deep gratitude for the opportunity to have taken you to brunch today." He removed a pouch of galleons from his right front pocket. "They say 'time heals all wounds,' but I think it takes a bit more than a long wait to achieve _absolution."_

She went pink at that last word as if he'd said another word entirely. He squeezed and released her hand, reached into the pouch, and retrieved several galleons, leaving far more than necessary on the table. He stood, moving behind her chair. She looked sorry to be done with the conversation. He wondered if it was because she was developing interest in him (as he hoped) or if she simply didn't spend much time with people willing to listen to her prattle on about social justice nonsense with rapt attention.

"If you would excuse me, I am meeting a lady friend this afternoon, and I'm afraid I may be running late. I would hate to keep her waiting."

"What?" Hermione shook her head, plastered the smile back on her face, and reached to shake his hand. "That's wonderful, sir. Draco hadn't mentioned you were seeing... but of course he wouldn't not to me, that's hardly my busi... well, I hope you have a lovely time. With your lady friend. Mr. Malfoy."

He could see the wheels in her head moving faster than the wings of a snitch. It took all that he had in him not to smirk. One thing he's learned in being married to Narcissa was that a woman never wanted him more than when she thought his attention was on another woman instead. He knew Hermione would leave him today and go home wondering who he'd hopped into bed with shortly after bidding her adieu, and it would drive her mad, and eventually she would think up some reason to see him again, and then he'd know he had her in the palm of his hand.

"Please, call me Lucius." He flipped their clasped hands, brought them up to chin level, then slowly placed a kiss - a chaste kiss, but a kiss nonetheless - on the back of her hand before releasing.

"Thank you for brunch." She held the kissed hand in her other, both up to her chest. "It was nice... Lucius."

He smiled, gave a slight bow of the head, and gestured for her to be first to the Departures apparition space in the front of the establishment. Once she was gone, he chuckled softly to himself and checked the time. Three hours. They'd spent three hours together. She'd spent three hours in his company, and left with a smile on her face.

Excellent.

He was about the step into the Departures space himself when a movement at Arrivals caught his eye. A couple had just appeared, presumably by side-along apparition, and the woman was... familiar.

"Lucius?"

She'd spotted him too. He smiled, willing himself to look casually, and certainly NOT to look at the too-bloody-young man on her arm.

"Narcissa, good morning."

"It's noon."

"Is it?" He checked his pocket watch. "Ah, so it is. Seems I've lost track of time." He extended his hand to the too-bloody-young man, who was eying him with a twinge of aggression. "Lucius Malfoy."

"Rochester Banks." The man shook his hand hard, a sure sign he felt intimidated and meant to assert his dominance, which almost made Lucius laugh out loud. The man did not understand his wife at all. A show of masculine chest-puffing wouldn't impress her. If Lucius wanted to divert her attention from him, there was only one thing he had to do.

"You've just missed my lady friend. We were having brunch. May I recommend the french toast bacon butties? Excellent. My only regret was that we'd opted to share, as I could have consumed the entire plate on my own." He chortled.

Narcissa's eyes flashed.

"What lady friend?"

"Oh, you don't know her," he said dismissively, though unable to help himself, he added, "You've heard of her, met a couple of times, but she's not a member of your social circle, thus you needn't worry."

"I'm not worried."

But she looked worried.

She also looked incredible. As pale as Hermione was tan, soft where Hermione was toned, elegantly aloof while Hermione seemed approachable, and sleek-haired, quite the opposite of Hermione's frazzle. His wife was impeccable dressed, as usual, in a floor-length dress with black lace over form-fitting black material, while Hermione had worn an egg-yolk yellow sundress, as bright and cheery as her personality. Or what he'd seen of her personality thus far, at any rate. Narcissa chose to expose just enough cleavage to draw the eye low, a purposeful choice as her small-but-pert breasts were among her finer assets, while Hermione hadn't been shy about showing off her legs, but had presumably done so without any consideration for where his gaze - or that of others - would go.

He found he quite liked both looks.

And wouldn't mind having both witches.

 _But one thing at a time,_ he thought, reminding himself of his little 'problem,' the one that had led to losing his wife in the first place. Damn.

"Look at me, Lucius."

Her tone was icy. Demanding. His smile grew. He knew what she wanted and why. Eye contact. Legilimency was so much easier with eye contact. Closing off his mind to intrusion, he let his steel gray eyes meet her cobalt blue ones.

"Yes, dear?"

"What lady friend?"

"I've already taken up too much of your time. Enjoy your date with... what was your name, young man? Robertson?"

"Rochestor."

"Of course, forgive me. Rochester."

Lucius stepped into the Departures space and inclined his head as he'd done when bidding farewell to Hermione. He tapped his cane twice on the floor quite unnecessarily, spun around on the spot, and disappeared.

Meanwhile, Draco was also out to brunch, seated beside Goyle and across from new friends Dean and Cho.

"Be honest with us, Draco." Cho leaned forward on her elbows, conspiratorially. "You fancy Hermione, don't you?"

"Of course not!" He jutted out his chin and sat up straighter, trying to look indignant, but apparently failing as both Cho and Dean laughed.

"Of course, _yes!"_ Dean swirled the celery garnish in his girlfriend's Bloody Mary. "Come off it, Draco. It's clear as the nose on Snape's face. Everyone saw the way you were looking at her in the pool."

"Can I help it if she looks good in a bikini? Doesn't mean I fancy her."

"I thought she looked good in the bikini," said Goyle, who was chewing his eggs with his mouth open. "I'd shag her."

It took all that was in Draco not to reply, "No, you bloody well _won't_ shag her!" Thankfully, Cho was quick with a response.

"Sorry, Goyle, but you haven't got a chance. She's an intellectual. She needs intellectual stimulation. That's why she and Ron Weasley didn't work out. He's too much of an idiot. Not a bad person, but she said they simply couldn't-"

"How's the workload in your department as of late, Dean?" Draco wanted to talk about Ron Weasley even less than he wanted to talk about how much he fancied Hermione.

"Ooh, cutting me off?" Cho's eyes sparkled. "You _do_ fancy Hermione! Why not tell her? Ask her to dinner. Take her to a library. Forget to invite anyone but the two of you to your next pool party!"

Dean and Cho sniggered. Goyle's mouth dropped open stupidly.

"But if he forgets to invite anyone else, won't be much of a party, eh? Just the two of them."

Draco rolled his eyes. "That's her point, Goyle. Eat your eggs."

"Okay." He shoveled in another bite.

"I'll ask her out for you." Cho took a sip of the Bloody Mary. "Mm, Dean, you should try this."

"No thank you."

"I don't want you asking her out for me!" Draco focused on his own meal, though he wasn't hungry anymore. "She and I are friends, that's all. And if I want to ask out a witch, I ask her. I don't need a mutual friend playing messenger Cupid. I'm not twelve."

"No need to get oversensitive and snippy with me!" Cho sounded affronted, but she was still smiling. "Wanted to help speed things along, that's all. She hasn't had a wizard in awhile, if you catch my meaning, and probably wouldn't mind helping you with your wandwork."

He almost wanted to tell them that he'd asked her out before only for her to solidify their status as friends at the end of their would-be "date," but such an admission would be far too humiliating, especially considering he was only just starting to become friendly with them outside of his friendship with her. Thankfully, Dean was merciful enough to turn the conversation in another direction, and Hermione's name was not mentioned again.

But Draco couldn't stop thinking about her.

* * *

 **A/N #2**

Sorry for the somewhat shorter chapter. Needed it for transition purposes, but hope you enjoyed. Things will be heating up soon. Please, as I said at the start of this chapter, keep in mind when reading a scene from Lucius' close-third person POV, you're seeing Hermione through HIS eyes. I don't intend to turn her into a doe-eyed dope in this fic, one who is easily manipulated and passed around by men, but at the moment, that's Lucius' intention. (Just don't want any more annoyed reviews or angry PMs. I mean, leave an honest review, please don't self-censor to spare my feelings, but I wanted that little bit to be clear.) Thanks!

 **-AL**


	7. Chapter 7

**CHAPTER SEVEN**

 ** _"...you said..._** ** _"_**

 ** _-Adele_**

A fortnight had passed since Hermione and Lucius' brunch 'date' and Draco's morning with Dean and Cho, and the two were the same as they'd been since they stopped being enemies...

Friends.

Draco tried some of his go-to tactics to appeal to her, but as she wasn't Pansy (who positively melted when complimented on her looks) or a random Muggle (with whom he could pretend to be literally anyone to appeal to her) he was at a bit of a loss, and decided hell, maybe it wouldn't hurt to do as his mother suggested.

Which is why he spent half of Monday morning checking his watch, waiting for a certain delivery to arrive at their shared 'office.' (More like a double-wide cubical.)

"Draco?" asked Hermione, thoughtfully. She, too, was elbow deep in paperwork, and was chewing the end of her quill. She had a streak of ink across the bridge of her nose and her hair was particularly unruly today, presumably due to the humidity. He thought she looked cute.

"Yes?"

"How can a woman tell if a man is interested in her?"

His heart skipped several beats as he mentally worked to formulate a reply.

"I suppose, if he asks to spend time with her..." he started. She cut him off.

"Yes, that's what I was thinking. And he has asked. And we've been spending time together. But-"

"He?"

"Yes. We started having meals together as he says he's interested in helping to pass that house-elf protection legislation we're drafting, but the more time we spend together, the more I suspect he's interested in me socially. But just when it seems something might be there - some spark - he mentions a lady-friend and hurries away. The odd thing is, as far as I can discern, he's not seeing a lady. If he is, they're keeping it very quiet. But if he's not, do you suppose he's pretending to be to make me jealous?"

"Er..." Draco glanced at his pocket watch. The delivery was due any minute. He wished he was a Legilimens like his mother, as he had no idea whether she was indeed seeing a man, or if she was referring to him. But how could she know his intention today was to pretend he'd started seeing someone in an attempt to make her jealous?

"Men don't really think we women fall for nonsense like that, do they? Do you? I mean, if I fancy a man, I fancy him. I don't need him to pretend to have another woman in his life so I'll feel threatened and throw myself at him."

 _Oh,_ Draco thought. Maybe she was using his mother's tactic on him! Maybe there was no man she was seeing who was possibly pretending to see someone else. Maybe she'd invented this mystery man to suss out whether Draco was interested in her. A small smile crept across his face. It quickly died.

"I'll admit, I was the jealous type when I was younger. Sixth year, I wanted to claw out the eyes of both Ronald Weasley and Lavender Brown for snogging each other all over the castle, and I did start seeing someone else to make him jealous, but I was seventeen years old, then! I'll be twenty-one next month, and I swear that year on the run aged me by an additional half a decade. I simply cannot imagine a grown man behaving the way I did as then." She swirled her quill in the ink absentmindedly. "He's infuriatingly complex. I can't see myself as the sort of witch he'd even want, nor could I have ever dreamed I'd end up interested in him, but every time we see each other, I start to think there's possibility there, if for no other reason than to help me be over Ron, you know? Someone new and exciting to keep the mind off... the past? Except there's a past there, too. A different sort of... and... Oh, Merlin!"

Shite. There must really be another man.

"Draco, you're a good friend, so please be honest with me. Would a grown man pretend to have another woman in his life to make a potential new one jealous? What do you think?"

"Er... I think..."

There was a rap on the wall of their cubical. A young, uniformed delivery girl poked her head in. "Draco Malfoy?"

"Yes?"

"Delivery for you, from..." The girl checked the card hanging off the basket and immediately went pink. "From 'your sexy secret lover.' Sent an hour ago, no response requested. Sign here."

"Your what?" Hermione snorted back a laugh. Draco went the same shade of pink as the girl as he quickly scrawled his name on the line. When he'd told Goyle to send it time-stamped after he was already at work because he wanted her to think it was from a sexy secret lover, he hadn't expected the card to literally read 'from your sexy secret lover.' _Salazar's balls, Goyle._

"Oh, Draco!" Hermione managed to hold back her giggles until the girl accepted a sickle and left. "I had no idea you had a sexy secret lover!"

"I don't," he snapped. He tried to wave Hermione away from the basket, but her eyes lit up when she was it was full of fancy chocolates, each spiked with a different expensive alcohol.

"Who is she, Draco?" She plucked out a firewhisky-infused dark chocolate heart. "Do I know her?"

"No. She's no one. She's a Muggle."

"She can't be." Hermione took a bite of the chocolate and closed her eyes. "Ohh, it's pure bliss."

"Why can't she be a Muggle? You think I'm still anti-Muggle?"

"I think a Muggle couldn't have found that new Diagon Alley chocolate shop." She tapped the logo on the box. "Is she a secret? Is your sexy secret lover a secret even from me?"

"Why shouldn't she be?" He scolded himself. That came out harsher sounding than intended. "Will you tell me the name of this man who might have another woman on the side?"

"No, no... Not yet, that is." She spoke casually but smiled shakily and he got the distinct impression she was keeping something important from him. While he had not inherited his mother's talent for Legilimency, he was naturally intuitive.

"Is he a friend of mine? Is it Blaise?"

"Blaise? No! Draco!" She bit the rest of the firewhisky heart in half. "How about this: I'll keep my friend a secret and you can keep yours one, and if either of us decides the person we're seeing is more than a mere fling, we'll reveal their identities... we'll go on a double date. Yes!" She snapped her fingers. "That's an excellent idea! If you think there's more to your relationship than... than what would result in being labeled 'sexy secret lovers,' and if I confirm both that my... dinner date... is as interested in me as I might be in him, we will meet at a restaurant, the four of us, and make each other's acquaintances then. A big reveal. It'll be fun!"

"Yeah," said Draco, mentally kicking himself, envisioning Goyle in a dress and wig, trying to pass for Sexy Secret Lover Girl. "Sounds fun."

That Friday, after work, Draco joined his mother and father for dinner at Malfoy Manor, at their insistence. It was unpleasant and awkward from go, at least as far as the youngest Malfoy was concerned.

"How is your work, Draco, darling?" asked Narcissa. The house-elves had prepared one of her favorite dishes for the main course, a roasted leg of lamb with garlic and rosemary, and she and Lucius were both drinking.

"I'll have a glass of wine, too," said Draco to an elf after starters were cleared away. He was tempted to ask for something stronger but did not wish to concern his parents.

"How is your latest paramour, Cissy?" asked Lucius, eying her over his own wine goblet. "Reginald?"

"Rochester," she corrected, running her forefinger long the rim of her glass until it whistled. "I'm afraid I don't know how he is these days. We're through."

"Oh?" He rose both eyebrows as if casually curious, but Draco caught the way the corner of his lip tried to turn up into a triumphant smile. "Sorry to hear that. What happened, my dear?"

"He had a tendency to take me out but go home with other women." She glared across the table at her estranged husband as if this behavior from her lover was his fault. "I can only take so much public humiliation."

Lucius put on an expression of exaggerated surprise. "Is that so? Funny, as I recall, public humiliation used to be something that interested you greatly, though I suppose it _is_ different in reality than in fantasy."

Narcissa's eyes flashed dangerously. Lucius smiled almost sweetly. Draco considered apparating himself directly to the bottom of the pool and refusing to surface until he was alone in the Manor. These two were a lot to take individually, and together, they were downright exhausting.

His mother had clearly dressed up tonight. She not only looked much better than she had the last time he saw her, she looked better than she usually would to have a casual dinner at home. (Her former home.) She wore a lush dark purple gown, for one thing, a form-fitting one with diamonds lining the low neckline and a slit up the the thigh, with silver stilettos and impeccably done makeup, her hair swept up into an ornate braid. She apologized upon her arrival, expressing that she'd just left 'a friend' and hadn't time to change before coming over, as she considered it unforgivably rude to be late, but Draco was sure his father knew as well as he did that this was bollocks.

Not that Lucius was any better.

He hadn't worn the dirty bedclothes since the day Snape dragged him unwillingly from his bedroom with the threat of a co-shower, but he also didn't typically bother getting into more than his button down collared shirts and trousers, perhaps under an open wizard's robe with his dragon hide boots, but tonight he wore an outfit she'd purchased for him years ago, with an imitation snakeskin vest and real pearls in place of buttons. His hair was brushed and looked fuller than it had weeks ago... Draco suspected Severus helped him out with a potion for that.

"I've only just arrived home myself," Lucius said when greeting her at the door. "An afternoon with a lady friend ran late. Fear not, though, we skipped the midday meal and worked up an appetite, thus I am more than ready for dinner."

Draco had quietly thumped his forehead agains the hallway wall and wished it was over already. (He was dressed as he had been at the Ministry. Pale blue shirt, dark blue trousers. Nothing fancy... though he had been wearing blue with a lot more frequency since Hermione mentioned it happened to be her favorite color.)

"We do this for you, you know," his mother had said, kissing his cheek in greeting. "It's important that we always remember we're a family, no matter what happens between your father and I. Someday we may have grandchildren, and I do not want any tension lingering between us. I would feel just awful if the little ones had to miss out seeing him for Christmas because I didn't feel comfortable inviting him to my home with the rest of you."

"Brilliant," Draco had replied. "My future children will be so relieved."

"Your wine, Master Malfoy."

He jolted. He'd been lost in thought, intently ignoring his parents at present. The elf placed the goblet beside his plate, looking him over with wide, sympathetic eyes. "Anything else, sir?"

"Kill me?"

"Beg pardon?"

"Nothing. Go on." He waved her away. His parents, still _at_ each other, hadn't noticed the interruption, nor had they realized their son was mentally checking out.

"I suppose I should be thankful you were courteous enough to wait until I was asleep to bed other women. Most of the time. When you were home."

"This is fun," said Draco, before taking a long sip of the wine. "So glad we get together to do this."

"Tell me, Cissy, now that you've laid down for more than half a dozen Quidditch players, is there a particular position you feel suits you best? Not Keeper, clearly. Perhaps Beater?"

"I'd say you already know all my favorite positions, Lucius, darling, but honestly you're getting up in years so I can't be certain you're capable of remembering that far back."

Draco downed the rest of his glass in two gulps and snapped his fingers for the elf, who appeared at once.

"More wine. Is the lamb ready?"

She shook her head, which made her bat-like ears flap. "Soon, sir."

"Not soon enough."

"Misty will return with more wine."

"Bring the bottle, please."

"Draco, darling, you've spent enough time listening to us... catch up." Narcissa glanced surreptitiously at Lucius. "Have you managed any progression with that witch you were interested in enticing? Did you take my advice?"

"Your advice backfired. Now she thinks I have a girlfriend and wants us to double-date. She says she might be seeing someone too, someone she's been spending time with."

"Delightful!" Narcissa clapped her hands together under her chin. "She didn't mention this man before your conversation?"

"Not exactly. She-"

"She invented him, same as you have your lady friend. She is sussing you out, trying to beat you at your own game. There's not man she 'might be' seeing. You're the man she's spending time with! Talking about her 'friend' in an effort to get you to reveal more about yours is a ploy, Draco, darling!"

"I agree with your mother," said Lucius, surprising them both. "Witches invent other wizards all the time to make men jealous. That's the reason your mother let herself be photographed with Roosevelt half a dozen times as of late. She was trying to get my attention."

"And that's the reason your father told me he'd been having brunch with a 'lady friend' when he knows as well as you and I do that he was sharing french toast with Severus Snape."

"I was with a lady friend," he said tersely, narrowing his gray eyes in her direction. She waved a hand dismissively.

"Of course you were, Lucius." She reached across the table to pat his hand as if with sympathy. "And I'm sure she's lovely."

"Don't patronize me, Cissy. I was indeed out with a woman, and if you must know, yes, she's lovely."

"Alright dear." She winked at Draco. "Your father was out to brunch with a woman who mysteriously vanished before I arrived, one he's _never_ been photographed with, despite the Prophet's obsession with featuring us in their society and gossip pages. A woman he just happened to bring to _my_ favorite brunch place, where he knew Rochester and I regularly-"

"I didn't know a damn thing about you and Roosterfeld!"

 _"Rochester!"_

Lucius' lip curled. Thankfully, at the moment the elf returned with more wine so he could refill his goblet.

"Hand to Salazar," he said, hand raised as if testifying to it. "I was out with a woman. A beautiful, intelligent one at that. If you want the truth, the reason I've been careful not to be photographed with her is because I wished to spare your feelings." He spoke his next words in a savage tone that churned Draco's stomach. "The fact of the matter is, she's _less than_ _half your age_ , Narcissa, a well-known and well respected woman, a beautiful and brilliant witch, who deserves neither your ire nor your judgement."

"So chivalrous of you, Lucius, protecting both her identity and my feelings." She batted her dramatically darkened eyelashes and chewed her dark red lower lip, wearing an expression of feigned innocence. "I do so appreciate the gesture, love."

He kept right on as if she hadn't spoken.

"But all through the meal, _Narcissa,_ I fed her berries and cream and felt up her thighs under the table while she wriggled for me until her little whimpers of pleasure became so pronounced, a waiter had to remind us we were in public."

"Oh, please." She chortled and removed a pack of cigarettes from the small beaded bag on the empty chair beside her. She lit one with her wand. "You expect me to believe that?"

"Why wouldn't you believe that?"

"Oh, Merlin, I don't know." She took a drag and blew the smoke downward and away from Draco, who coughed anyway. "Could it be because I know without a doubt that you haven't managed to make a woman _whimper with pleasure_ since before Bella was broken free from Azkaban? Yes, that must be it. You haven't made a-"

"I seem to remember _you_ whimpering with pleas-"

"SHUT IT!" Draco stood and slammed his hand so hard on the table, the dishes rattled. "I cannot take another moment with the two of you like this. I have to leave. You finish dinner without me. Or don't. Kill each other, snog each other, make each other cry, I don't care what you do, but leave me out of it!" He downed the entire second glass of wine in several huge sips, put the goblet back on the table, and wiped his mouth with his white cloth napkin, which he then threw down to his chair. "Good night!"

"Well," said Narcissa, looking as shocked by this outburst as Lucius felt. "He's certainly high-strung these days, isn't he? The poor boy, things must not be going well with that witch he fancies."

"I don't know what to do with him." Lucius sipped what was left from his own wine and reached for the bottle by Draco's plate. "He's at an impossible age."

Draco considered storming off to Goyle's family home or Dean's new flat, but ultimately, there was only one friend he wanted to vent to, which is why he found himself on Hermione's doorstep, knocking, hoping against hope that she wasn't spending a cozy night at home with her mystery man.

She was wearing pajamas when she opened the door, a big bowl of popcorn cradled in one arm, a bottle of butterbeer in the other, her wand sticking out of her messy bun.

"Draco! Come in! I was just... uh..."

"Sleeping?"

"I was about to watch a movie, actually." She jerked her head toward the television, which was set in a large cabinet lined with books. "Have you ever seen one?"

"I've seen a telly before," he said. They had them in Muggle shops and pubs sometimes, but he'd never actually sat down with the express purpose of looking at one. He shut the door and followed her to the worn but comfortable brown couch. He'd been in her flat before, but the doors hiding the television away were usually closed. Currently there were a man and woman frozen on the screen, riding some sort of motorcycle and smiling. The entire picture was in grayscale and the words "Play," "Scene Selection" and "Extras" ran along the side of the screen.

"What brings you here?" she asked.

"My parents." He sighed. "I had to get away from them."

"Oh?" She shot him a look of concern. "They were... together?"

"We were having dinner together. Or trying to. But they can't leave each other alone. Not two minutes goes by without one cutting down the other. I wish they'd either reconcile or divorce, because I cannot live with this in-between much longer."

"That's... terrible." Hermione sighed through her nose, her lips pushed together so hard they were starting to go white. Her brow was furrowed and she looked momentarily lost in thought.

"Something wrong?"

"No!" Her face relaxed, she even smiled, but it was a shaky one, like in the office the other day. "I don't understand why... It's nothing. Would you like to stay and watch the movie? If you'd rather go out, I'll get dressed, but I've been looking forward to-"

"Let's watch the movie." He had no desire to go out, not even with Hermione. Not tonight. Staying in - especially _with_ Hermione - seemed a much better alternative. And the popcorn smelled amazing.

"This is called Roman Holiday. It's an old romantic comedy, a classic, featuring several old Hollywood stars, some of the biggest. I've never seen it before. I have it because I sent away for..." Her cheeks went slightly pink. She placed the popcorn bowl on the small table opposite the couch, beside a plate of homemade chocolate biscuits. "Would you like a drink? I have butterbeer, or if you'd rather, wine or-"

"Butterbeer is fine," he said quickly. The very thought of more wine made him feel slightly ill. He didn't usually drink much of it, as it was an acquired taste (he assumed, as his parents seemed to have acquired it while he did not) and he worried more might make him sick. She handed him the one she'd already opened and hurried into the kitchen for another, calling more information over her shoulder.

"I joined a Classic Romance of the Month Club," she confessed, as if this were something to be embarrassed about. "On the first of every month, they mail me four DVDs - DVDs are little round discs that... no, it's too complicated, I'll explain when I show you..." She popped the top on a butterbeer, grabbed a handful of napkins, and returned to the couch, where Draco was sat. "About once per week, to unwind, I watch a movie. On the twenty-ninth, I mail them back and await new ones. Last week's was Casablanca and the week before, It Happened One Night. I'm excited this week because I like the actress, Audrey Hepburn. She was lovely! In Sabrina, she fell in love with a man when she was very young, but over the course of getting to know him better, she ended up realizing she was better suited to his brother, that she was with the wrong man, and when they finally..." Hermione abruptly cut off. Though Draco was staring up at her with rapt attention, she suddenly felt silly sharing this with him. "Like Roman Holiday, it's a classic. For Muggles." She sat beside him and reached for the old knitted blanket her grandmother made her when she was a baby. It was big enough to cover two people so she spread it across their laps.

"To protect the couch, and our clothes," she said, but he didn't need the explanation. He was happy to be under a blanket with her, even if it was to watch some silly Muggle invention that would no doubt bore him. She bent up her knees, balancing the biscuit plate on top of them, with the bowl precariously positioned between them. He kept both feet on the floor, his butterbeer bottle between his knees.

"Ready?" she asked.

"Sure," he answered. He reckoned it wouldn't be the worst way he'd ever spent an evening. A Muggle movie - a classic romantic comedy, no less - sounded bloody stupid, but he'd survive.

How very wrong he was!

Stupid, it was not! Scarcely ten minutes after Hermione noxed the lights and selected Play with the help of a rectangular black box, Draco found himself completely enraptured in the story of a runaway Muggle princess in Rome (and the reporter who recognized her). They shared the popcorn and biscuits and when the butterbeers were gone, she used her wand to start the elective kettle for tea. (Another intriguing Muggle contraption.)

They laughed out loud at parts and he peppered her with questions about the Muggle world during others, and at the end, he felt a twinge in his belly that told him he was moved by the unexpected conclusion, though he'd never admit something so silly.

"I loved it!" Hermione said as the credits rolled. She turned to him with tears streaming down her cheeks. "I loved it more than The Philadelphia Story!"

He didn't know what this meant, but those seemed to be happy tears, so he smiled.

"It was really good. Are all movies like that?"

"We can watch so many, Draco! I'll introduce you to all of my favorites, and-"

A sharp rap at her door surprised them both.

"Who could that be?" She placed the popcorn bowl on the table, wrapped herself in the blanket, and went to the door, peeking through the keyhole.

"OH!"

"Who is it?" he asked.

The person knocked again.

"Hermione?" called a familiar voice. "It's Lucius."

"Lucius?" Draco was on his feet and to the door in a flash, almost as if he's apparated there. He tore it open before Hermione could respond. "Father?! What are you doing here?"

"Draco?" Lucius shook his head, quickly composing himself. "Draco! Good. I was hoping you would be here. I got the address from one of my Ministry connections - forgive me for invading your privacy, Miss Granger." He nodded at Hermione over Draco's shoulder. She nodded back, looking somewhat dazed. "Draco, your mother is worried about you, after you stormed out like that tonight, creating such a scene." He tutted as if to a petulant child. "She first asked me to find you, then changed her mind, as she does not want you to feel smothered. She's afraid you'll resent her for sending me to track you down, as you're an adult now and free to come and go as you please. But for her sake, come back with me to Malfoy Manor. Unless she was too upset to wait, she's still in the library, pacing."

"I'll see her this weekend," said Draco testily. "We're watching a movie."

"A movie?" Lucius cocked an eyebrow. "What fun. I'll leave you two friends to it, then."

There was an awkward silence, during which no one quite made eye contact with anyone else.

"On that note, goodnight, son. Miss Granger."

"Goodnight, Father."

"Goodnight... Mr. Malfoy." Hermione, not Draco, closed the door as Lucius made his way down the walk, back toward the safe apparition point (away from Muggles' prying eyes).

"Can you believe him?" asked Draco furiously, throwing up his hands, heading back toward the couch. "Coming here to check on me, trying to drag me home to Mother! After ten, and from a friend's house, one to which he was not invited! And getting your address from a contact. Treating me like a child! What was he thinking?"

"Yes," said Hermione quietly. She brushed aside the curtain, watching Lucius until he disappeared around the corner. "What was he thinking?"

* * *

 **A/N:**

Thank you to everyone reading, reviewing, following, and adding to faves! I'm glad to see such a great reception for this fic thus far - I was worried that toeing the line between Dramione and Lumione would be too much of a turnoff for readers. :) I hope you're enjoying and that you don't mind a slow burn. If you're a Dramione fan, I posted two prompt-inspired HGDM one-shots this week, and also started a short Draco/Hermione humor fic (5 chapters) that starts when they're already engaged, called If You Can't Stand the Heat, rated T. Thanks again for reading! And thanks in particular to those who have reviewed thus far: **roon0, Sundaegirl99, clarasnotlikely, PopularCats, thfourteenth, skyeryder01, HarryPGinnyW4eva, kalilje, pgoodrichboggs, Calindy, Guest(s), AngelAzazel88, kittkatt08, IGOTEAMEDWARD, Francesca, MoonlitSnowFox, annapsarudaki, Alice1420, ForsakenKalika, Jces999, Nastytashy, Adela-Elli, lilikaco, Redbeardswoman, sassanech, Kat, malugargula, houstonclay, lun27, thewinnowingwind,** and **The Gryffindor Hatstall**. Your feedback is my motivation and reward and I greatly appreciate all of it!

 **-AL**


	8. Chapter 8

**CHAPTER EIGHT**

 _ **"Nothing but the best..."**_

 **-Adele**

Three weeks had passed - three full weeks! - since Draco and Hermione's Roman Holiday movie date, and in the twenty-one days since, he'd not managed to come any closer to confessing his interest in her.

He had, however, spent a considerable amount of time discussing his relationship with the "sexy secret lover" or whatever the bloody hell Goyle had called himself, and she was starting to feel so real Draco was dreading having to break it off with her. Every Friday evening, when he and Hermione met at her place to watch the week's classic romantic comedy, they made dinner together (popcorn or puddings for after) and she gave him advice, while also seeking some herself. It seemed, unless she was a stellar actress, that her mystery man actually existed, which really burned Draco's biscuit. Who was this man she was becoming so enamored with, and why didn't Draco know a damn thing about him save for the little details she'd accidentally let slip here and there?

It was Friday, just before lunch break, when Draco left his office (shared cubical) to use the loo only to find it was being cleaned.

"Can't you hurry?" he asked the house elf. "I have to go!"

"Use the ladies'," the unsympathetic elf said gruffly. "I have work."

Grumbling, he crossed the hall to the women's toilet. He knocked twice on the door before poking his head in to call, "Anyone in here? No?"

He would never have done such a thing under normal circumstances, but he'd had to pee since nine-fifteen and was on the verge of exploding, thus he hurried in and closed himself into a stall, barely registering that unlike the men's, this room had couches, a table, and potpourri everywhere, like a bloody lounge. He was about to flush when the door creaked open. _Fuck!_ He couldn't exit while a woman was in here, he didn't want to get caught and labeled some sort of pervert, so he closed the lid, sat down, lifted his feet, and prayed they wouldn't be long.

"I need to know more about this mystery man," one woman was saying. He immediately recognized the voice. Cho. And if that was Cho, chances are, she was talking to... "Hermione, come on, I'm serious. You're driving me bonkers by dropping all of these little hints without confirming anything. Who is he?"

"He's nobody!" Hermione laughed.

 _Salazar's balls,_ thought Draco. _I hope I'm not about to hear them pee._

He didn't know why, but the thought of hearing HERMIONE use the loo made him feel like even more of a creep than if a stranger had come in. Or what if - worse! - she had to do something... else? He shuddered. Why didn't the Ministry allow apparating within its walls? Stupid fucking rule if he ever heard one.

"You have a comb I can borrow?" asked Cho.

"I have a brush."

Draco leaned forward to peer through the crack in the stall door. He could see the two witches standing side-by-side in front of the mirrors, primping. Oh, thank Merlin. He was somewhat surprised, as Hermione didn't seem the primping type, especially at work, but he'd sit here for an hour while they applied makeup and plaited each other's hair (assuming that's what girls do in a loo) if it meant not having to spend a single second hearing something more... personal.

Besides... A small smile came to his lips. Maybe he was about to learn much more about her mystery man. Cho wasn't the type to give up easily. She'd bugged him several times over the last month about asking out Hermione, volunteering on multiple occasions to arrange a double-date between them with her and Dean. He sat back, crossed his arms, and rested his feet against the door. This could be good.

"He's an enigma. Honestly, he's not the sort of man I could ever see myself with, but maybe that's good? After everything over the last three years - that year on the run with Harry and Ron, and then trying to settle into normal life... Normal life is a bit dull at times, you know? And this man, the thought of him is... exciting. It feels so wrong, and I'm almost ashamed to say that only intrigues me more. I mean, for one thing... and no offense to Harry or Ron... or Viktor or Ollie... or George... but I'm going to be twenty-two in matter of days and I honestly can't say I've ever had _good_ sex. Not the kind you and Ginny and Parvati talk about."

Draco's jaw dropped cartoonishly.

"You had sex with Harry?" asked Cho.

"Well... no. Not all-the-way sex, but almost, and anyway, it was a one-off, while we were... it was while we were on the run, and stressed, and Ron had left... There was a lot happening and it was a mistake. But then, after the Final Battle, Ron was my first, and when we split I had that evening with George-"

"His _brother_ George?!"

"Just the once! We'd been drinking! It was a mistake, a bigger mistake than the Harry mistake, a _one time_ lapse in judgement! Please keep it quiet, if Ron finds out... We're friends, he and I, but I don't think we're friendly enough that he wouldn't be bothered by it. And you can't tell him about me and Harry, either. You've seen how he looks at Ollie when they meet in the lift and all he knows for sure is that we'd been out a few times.."

Draco covered his mouth. So she'd shagged not one, but two Weasleys? And almost did Potter? And who the hell was Ollie?

She hadn't mentioned any of this during their movie dates.

"I won't say a word, I promise. Mascara?"

"Only brown, not black."

"It'll due. I have a lunch date. Dean's taking me to a new place and I want to look pretty for him. I know it's silly, we see each other almost every day, but I didn't get dressed this morning expecting to see him this afternoon, so..."

"It's yours to use," said Hermione. "Do you have anything for my complexion? I have this bump forming here..."

There were a few seconds of ambient noises during which he reckoned they were fishing around in their overlarge handbags.

"Oliver's not terrible," said Cho. She made a smacking noise with her mouth, presumably having just applied lipstick. "He chatted me up after work a few times last year, before Dean, and I thought, 'why not?' We slept together maybe eight, ten times? I know he's technically my boss, but..."

So they were talking about Oliver Rivers, a wizard about ten years their senior who worked down the hall, the supervisor of Parvati and Cho. Draco frowned. Oliver Rivers was a fit, classically attractive dark-haired, tan-skinned former Head Boy, the intellectual type. Could she be seeing him now, but not letting on to Cho? He would certainly make for stiff competition, given his intellect, age, and that tattoo on his back all the witches at the pool party seemed to like tracing their fingers over.

Not that Draco thought Hermione was the tracing-fingers-over-tattoos type, but he couldn't help wondering what she'd think if he got something or other on his bicep...

"Oliver's not terrible, but he's selfish," said Hermione. "And when he's done..."

"He's done!" Cho finished with her. They both laughed.

Draco smirked. If there was one thing no witch could say about him, it was that he was selfish in bed and therefore left them unsatisfied. During the second of only two sex talks he'd had with his father (the first being of the "she's a flower and you're a watering can, so that's how babies are made' variety) Lucius had imparted a bit of wisdom: "If she's not happy with you, she'll find someone else to make her happy. So the only way to keep yourself happy is to ensure she's happy too... preferably, first _and_ last. Give her a reason to return." His smirk faded, however, as it occurred to him that his father had basically foretold the dissolution of his own marriage. Narcissa had made her 'unhappiness' in that regard uncomfortably clear.

"Viktor was fine," Hermione continued. "He was my first kiss, and after Ron and I broke up and then I had that one time with George, I needed something... something I knew I could enjoy but not regret, you know? So I wrote him about meeting up, we used to be penpals, and one thing led to another..."

"He was only fine, though?"

Draco leaned close to the crack again. He could make out Hermione's left side, barely. She shrugged.

"We spent a couple of months together. I'd give him an O for Stamina, but a D for Creativity. He was wooden, mechanical, as if following a playbook. No finesse. I usually had to take care of myself while he was... working at it."

Cho snickered. "He's better on a broom than in a bed is what you're saying?"

"If the Quidditch uniform fits..."

They both giggled pretty hard at this as Draco wondered what, if anything, Pansy and her friends said about him in the ladies'.

(He hoped "mechanical" wasn't among the descriptors.)

"What's different with Mystery Man, then?" asked Cho. "You think he's the creative type?"

"Well, he's older, for one, like I told you before. And he has - or had - a reputation for womanizing, which is a turn-off, but then, what if he's incredible? I cannot picture myself seriously falling for him, being in love with a man like that, but a little fun..."

"A little fun...?"

"I mean, you're always telling me I'm too cautious and tense, Cho! And Ginny says the same. She says I need to let go, switch off my responsible inner voice and enjoy myself. And I think, with him, I could... _enjoy myself."_

"What's stopping you, then? Sounds like you know what you want to do."

"I don't know." There was more rustling noise. Draco couldn't see what Hermione was doing, but she must have been looking through her bag for something. "He's... respectful. More so than I ever would have guessed. Sometimes I'm not even certain he's interested. He used to mention another woman, but not in the last few weeks, so... I just don't know."

"Another woman?" Cho sounded skeptical. "He's dating someone? Or he's married?"

"I've tried not to ask too many questions about... that."

"Then what do you do together, if not shag or talk?"

"We _do_ talk! We talk about other things! We've shared meals I can't tell you how many times now and while we eat, we talk about everything! He's interested in our work here, he's an excellent listener, and recently he's been letting me borrow books... he owns so many books! After I've read them we discuss the contest, whether it's a frivolous novel or something academic, it doesn't matter, we pick it apart together, which I love. You know I'm partial to a man who knows how to use his brain..." There was a pause. He peaked through the crack again. He could see her tying back her hair into a messy bun. "No offense to Ronald."

Cho cracked up at this. "Poor sweet stupid Ron Weasley. I'm not surprised wit beyond measure wasn't among his greatest treasures." She sniggered. "Not to be unkind, but he never struck me as particularly bright, honestly."

"He's no Gregory Goyle," said Hermione, "But since we finished school the most challenging thing he's read are those Mad Muggle comic books. Don't get me wrong, I like Ron, I do, but there's a reason it could never work between us, not long-term."

"I understand. As a Ravenclaw, I know all about the importance of an intellectually stimulating man. And your Mystery Man, he's intellectually stimulating?"

"In my imagination, more than 'intellectually,'" Hermione confessed. "But I cannot for the life of me work out if he feels the same."

Draco nearly grunted. So she was fantasizing about this random bloke? He couldn't help feeling both deeply jealous and a twinge nauseas at the thought.

"You know..." Cho said teasingly. "If your Mystery Man doesn't lead you down that road, I know a wizard who'd probably be willing to provide you with both kinds of stimulation."

Hermione laughed. "Sure. Who?"

"Draco Malfoy."

"Draco?"

His heart skipped several beats as he nearly fell off the closed toilet seat. He peered through the gap. To his disappointment, he could see her shaking her head.

"Draco's my friend. We're becoming very good friends, actually. But he doesn't _fancy_ me. With all the time we've spent together in the last year, if he wanted anything beyond friendship, I'd _know._ He'd have said something already. Or, at the very least, hinted."

"Maybe he has," said Cho. "Maybe he's been hinting and you haven't noticed. Come on, Hermione, he's cute. A little pale for my taste, and too snobbish..."

Draco narrowed his eyes at the crack in the door. He was NOT _snobbish._

"But he's matured since Hogwarts, hasn't he? Reformed, paid his debt to society, broadened his mind, all of that! And he's clever, funny, rich, handsome... Everything a witch could want!"

"He's not interested, trust me."

"What if he is? You could take the initiative, you know. You could ask him out."

"Are you serious?" Hermione scoffed. "Please. He's got a girlfriend, Cho! A great one, from the sound of it. Her name is Mary Sue. She's a Muggleborn who went to Ilvermorny, but she's originally from Canada. He talks about her all the time and I don't want to come between them. I'm not that sort of person."

Mary bloody Sue from bloody Canada was ruining his whole bloody life. Why _why WHY_ did he take his mother's advice and invent a girlfriend? Now he was stuck in a monogamous pretend relationship while the object of his actual affections was considering a fling just for the sake of good sex. This situation could not possibly get any worse.

He needed to talk to someone. He needed to confide in someone who wouldn't steer him as wrong as his mother had.

Yes, that's what he needed.

It was decided. Tonight, after work...

 _His father would hear about this._

Meanwhile, at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Severus Snape was hearing about this.

"You've been seeing WHOM?" the Potions Master asked, agog, staring at his friend over a glass of wine. They were in his office having a light nosh, as he had no classes on Fridays until third year Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws together at two-thirty.

"I've been taking her to brunch, to dinner. She cooked for me twice at her home."

"How is she?"

"In bed?"

"As a cook!" Severus looked scandalized. Lucius let out an undignified snort.

"Why, are you looking to hire one?"

Severus regarded him sternly, as if he were but a misbehaving student and not a former Death Eater five years his senior.

"You haven't... _had her_... have you?"

"You think I'm incapable?!" Lucius stood, sloshing a little wine over the side of his glass. "Did Narcissa say something to you? If so, she was lying. She lies. She doesn't think it emasculating enough to be photographed parading around the continent with younger men, she needs people to think I'm... I'm..." He couldn't even think the word 'impotent,' much less use it. "Less of a man."

"Narcissa said nothing to me," Severus assured him calmly, gesturing for him to return to his chair, though he regarded the man with a questioning look as he did so. "I am merely curious as to whether you've been bedding a twenty-year-old girl, one your sister-in-law tortured on the floor of your Drawing Room, one your comrade nearly killed in the Department of Mysteries, one who could have died at the hand of any number of Death Eaters during the war without causing you a second of remorse over the loss. Quite frankly, Lucius, I thought the girl had more sense than..." Severus looked his friend up and down discerningly. "Than to be with someone like you."

"She's nearly twenty-two, not twenty, and I believe you are underestimating how charming and attractive I can be."

"Perhaps. Or I've been _overestimating_ how intelligent and pragmatic Miss Granger can be."

Lucius sneered. "As my closest friend, Severus, should you not be more supportive in this? Should I take her to bed, she will be the first since my wife embarked on her 'European tour.' I have not confessed this to you today because I am seeking your judgement."

"You've confessed to me because you want my support?" Severus scoffed, turning his attention back to the scotch eggs in front of him. "I apologize, old man, but I cannot give it. She's the same age as your son. She's been to hell and back. And considering her newfound interest in you, I'm not convinced war-related post-traumatic stress isn't causing her to behave irrationally. I realize I advised you to find a new woman to take your mind off Narcissa, but the 'brains of the Golden Trio' wasn't the one I had in mind. Why don't I reintroduce you to Septima Vector? She would be an age-appropriate companion, and as a former Slytherin I don't believe she'll hold your past against you."

"I do not understand you, Severus." Lucius set down his wine glass, highly affronted. "I am a person of many positive qualities-"

"I agree!" Severus took a bite.

"Then why do you think Miss Granger's too good for me?"

"I did not say I think she's 'too good' for you." He swallowed. "I think she's _not good_ for you. There's a difference."

"Not good enough?"

"I did not say that either."

"Then what the fuck are you saying, Snape?" Lucius stood again, this time slamming his palm down on the tabletop.

"No need to get testy, Malfoy." Severus shook his head and waited for his friend to retake his seat. "I understand Miss Granger's appeal, but-"

"You want her for yourself, then?"

Severus sighed.

"I am going to be painfully honest with you. Are you prepared?"

"Of course."

"I think you're seeking a substitution for Narcissa, one you would like to be temporary, as there is no doubt in my mind your ultimate goal is reconciliation with your wife." He sipped his wine and set down the class. "I also think Miss Granger had a difficult time during the war, to say the least, and that she still bears the scars - both literal and figurative - of the torment she underwent at the wand... and teeth... of Bellatrix, among others. You were in Azkaban for most of the summer after the Dark Lord fell, but I was hospitalized with an abundance of time on my hands, during which I read every Prophet article and trial transcript I could get my hands on."

Lucius downed the rest of his wine. Thus far, nothing Snape had said was untrue.

"To be completely honest, it concerns me that Miss Granger is interested in you, as I cannot help wondering if she is experiencing some sort of self-destructive period, one that would not be helped by falling into a relationship of sorts with a man _clearly_ intent on using her for sex and nothing more, a man who has been feigning interest in her interests for how long now?"

"A few months," Lucius admitted in a mumble.

Severus put both elbows on the table, tented his fingers, and rested his chin on them.

"While I will not pretend Miss Granger was ever one of my favorite students, she _does_ remind me in several ways of an equally brilliant and overly-moral Muggleborn know-it-all for whom I once cared deeply, and I therefore cannot help having some small affinity for her..." He shook his head. "No, more of a... sympathy... for her, and for that reason I do not wish to see her hurt by a man twice her age whose primary goal in conquering her is goading his estranged wife back into his bed."

"Fair enough." What could Lucius say to that? It was all accurate, save for... "But I have not been 'feigning interest in her interests.' At first, I was, I confess, but she's surprisingly fascinating, and funny, and I genuinely enjoy the time we spend together. If I were seeking only to get her into bed, I'd have made a move by now, but it's been months and I've not laid a finger on her, save to kiss her hand or cheek. I have been respectful and patient, and in the process I've learned she's more than just the swotty unkempt right hand of Potter I saw her as two or three years ago. She's matured into a delightful woman, I've changed and am a decent man, and what if the possibility of more than a fling is there, Severus? Should I deny us what we both seem to want because you're worried about her mental state?"

"No," said Severus, stabbing the last of his lunch with his fork. "But if you're the decent man you claim to be, you'll deny yourself what _you_ want because _you're_ worried about her mental state."

* * *

 **A/N:**

To answer Qs both on here and from the FB Granger group about whether this fic will include Lucius/Hermione stuff, whether it will end up Dramione, or anything related to pairings, all I can tell you is that this is a Lumione Dramione Lucissa fic so anything is possible, but if you really want to know who ends up with whom at the end I will tell you via PM (but please, if I do, don't include spoilers in future reviews).

Thanks for reading!

 **-AL**


	9. Chapter 9

**CHAPTER NINE**

 ** _"Couldn't fight it..."_**

 **-Adele**

Severus was wrong.

There wasn't anything mentally wrong with Hermione Granger.

She was in tip top shape, both mentally and - dare he think it - physically. He'd spent many an evening as of late thinking about her shape, as a matter of fact. Thinking about her. Obsessing, almost. Wondering. Wondering if she was self-destructive, if she was suffering post-traumatic stress, if she was losing her mental faculties. He'd started worrying about it even before Snape vocalized the same fears he'd kept secret, and he couldn't help thinking the second opinion lent legitimacy to them.

But she seemed fine to him.

After leaving Hogwarts that afternoon, he headed straight back to Malfoy Manor to think. Upon realizing he was alone in the home, he decided upon a swim. A mind-clearing, relaxing swim.

But he was neither able to clear his mind, nor relax.

He sighed and turned onto his back, floating, staring up at the glass ceiling. He should have enchanted it before getting in the water, as it was a gross and gray rainy day and he's much rather be looking up at sunshine or stars.

He and Narcissa had been married for over five years before Draco was born, much to the chagrin of both their sets of parents, who were pushing for grandchildren. It wasn't that they didn't want a child, someday. But he adored his new wife and wanted to enjoy her, especially as they were in the middle of a war at the time with so little to enjoy on a daily basis. He liked that he only had to worry about surviving the Dark Lord's missions so he could come home to her, without worrying about an innocent baby in her arms, one that could be taken or harmed by their enemies… or by their fellow Death Eaters.

When she had gotten pregnant, it had been unplanned. Everyone in their social circle and everyone in their families (save for her mother and sister) had assumed there was a conception issue, that they'd been trying for years and had finally managed to conceive, and the congratulations were especially boisterous as a result. Many of his friends had clapped him on the back with a "Finally, mate!" or "About time!" while her friends had said things like, "You must be terribly relieved" and "After waiting so long, such a blessing!"

But they weren't relieved and it wasn't about time.

That said, they were thrilled when their little Draco was born. He was a week later than expected and labor seemed to take forever but he was perfection. Ten tiny fingers, ten tiny toes, smooth unblemished skin, soft, silky hair, a little lower lip that puffed out when he cried, just like his mother's…

When he was three months old Lucius walked in on Narcissa in front of a full-length mirror, staring judgmentally at her bare upper body, cradling the nursing baby to her breast with a pale yellow burp cloth draped over her shoulder. She wore only a silk half-slip, her hair fell limp around her face, and she looked as though she'd been crying. There were dark circles under her red-rimmed eyes. She hadn't slept much since he was born.

"I have stretch marks," she said upon catching Lucius' eye in the reflection. "I used Essence of Dittany all through the pregnancy, but there they are. See? And there's this pouch of fat here – Mother says no matter how much weight I lose, it may never go away. And my eyesight's worse since having him. As of this morning, I'm wearing contact lenses. Do you know what those are? Muggles use them. I have to use a Muggle product _in my eyes_ just to bloody see." She'd sniffled and her eyes watered. "I have more stripes on my body than a tiger."

"I hardly noticed," he'd said, moving behind her, wrapping an arm around her abdomen. He'd kissed her cheek and smiled down at the baby. "I think you're both beautiful."

"Never again," she'd whispered, letting the tears fall. "I'm grateful he's a boy, because I won't have another." She made a strangled, gulping sound, like she was staving off sobs. He kissed her neck. She shrugged him away. "Draco's made me ugly."

"You're not ugly."

But she'd shaken her head and insisted. "I'm not as I was. And I'll not do it again. I made an appointment with a Healer for Halloween, in the morning. That's the soonest they'll do it, so I have to be careful not to risk conceiving again between now and then. We can't be together, not until... after." She met his eye. "I'm sorry."

"Sorry because we can't be together?"

"Sorry for everything." She bit her lip, hard, but that did not keep her from crying. "Sorry for the stretch marks, sorry for the little pouch, sorry for my ruined eyes. Sorry I'll never again be pretty for you."

"That's not true."

"Sorry I've made an appointment and sorry I won't cancel it, not even if you beg or order or threaten me."

He couldn't quite follow.

"An appointment with a Healer? For what, exactly?"

" _One son,_ Lucius. That's all your mother told me I would have to provide." She gently unlatched baby Draco and brought his head up to her shoulder, alternating patting his back and rubbing it in circles to gently coax a burp. "I have done my duty as your wife."

"Giving me a child shouldn't feel like your duty," he'd said.

Baby Draco belched, a loud, healthy one, then spit up a little on the cloth. She cleaned his face and kissed his forehead.

"Narcissa..."

"I used to be beautiful," she said, and then she was crying so hard he'd had to take the baby. She sank to the floor, hugging her arms around her sore, enlarged breasts. "Now I'm striped and blind and fat and I… I leak!"

She'd wailed that last word with such anguish it was almost comical, thus he'd held back a chuckle, thinking her over-dramatic, even though his father had warned him she might get this way. Apparently his own mother had been damn near suicidal in the months after his birth, and had all but turned over his care to a house-elf until he was a year old. At least Narcissa wasn't talking about throwing herself off a bridge or threatening to purposely overdose on Dreamless Sleep. He sat beside her, summoned over a blanket from their bed, and settled the baby onto it, on his tummy. Draco's eyelids drooped. He nearly always fell asleep after nursing.

"You should put him on his back," she'd said. "It's not safe for him to sleep that way."

"Very well." Lucius thought she was being nitpicky, as it wasn't as if anything would happen to the boy with them sitting right bloody there, but he flipped the baby to appease her anyway.

Six weeks later, on Halloween morning, 1980, she had the procedure that would render her unable to conceive another child.

Exactly one year later, the Dark Lord fell. Late the following night, her sister was arrested. And the morning after that, her mother had a heart attack and died.

"I lost my sister, I lost my mother, and now I'll never have a daughter!" Narcissa had sobbed against his shirt while one-year-old still-nursing Draco wailed hungrily in the background. "I'm sorry, Lucius. I'm so sorry! I think... I think I've made a terrible mistake!"

Through the years that passed, Lucius was more careful than most men about birth control. He knew impregnating a mistress (as his father had... _twice)_ would just about kill his wife, and he had no desire to hurt her. He loved her. Despite the extramarital sex, of which there had been a lot, he loved her.

They both cherished their son, especially knowing he was to be the only one, and when Lucius returned from Azkaban to learn that the boy had been branded with the Dark Mark and sent to murder Dumbledore, a task at which he failed, one that could have gotten him killed, Lucius was certain it was the end of his marriage. He wasn't sure she could ever forgive him for having screwed up as badly as he did, for having failed the Dark Lord so completely, for being the reason their son had to spend an entire school year risking his life. He wasn't sure she'd forgive him for being the reason she and Severus Snape made the Unbreakable Vow.

"I offered to sleep with him as payment, or in gratitude," she had confessed to Lucius late one night, shortly after the Ministry fell under the Dark Lord's control and her husband was released from prison. "I told him I would do _anything._ He told me that would not be necessary."

"I would not have faulted you if you had," replied Lucius delicately, glad he wouldn't have to murder his friend as he would have had the man taken her up on the offer. "Anything to keep Draco safe."

 _"Anything,"_ she whispered vehemently in agreement. "I'd fall on a sword for our only son without a second thought. I don't care a whit whether the Dark Lord defeats Harry Potter; I just want to know our son is safe."

"He'll kill us both if he learns you feel that way."

"I don't care. I love Draco above all else. His safety and happiness are all that matter."

"I love you," Lucius had said. "I would fall on a sword for _you,_ Cissy." Then Lucius had held her and kissed her and tried to engage intimately… tried to make her feel better physically… the way he'd always placated her before Azkaban. But his body would not respond to her touch and, eventually, she gave up while he apologized and blamed everything from the late hour to the night's overindulgence of red wine.

That, he'd long thought, was the beginning of the end of their marriage, but now, on his back in the pool, listening to rain pound on the glass ceiling above and all around, he wondered if the tension hadn't been building long before that, before his arrest. She hadn't been happy about his affair with the too-young ginger, the first to have been both emotional and physical, and she hadn't been happy when the Dark Lord set up shop on their fourth floor, the one on which she and Lucius had lived until his parents passed. She hadn't been happy about his expulsion from the Hogwarts Board of Governors after that embarrassing Chamber of Secrets diary fiasco, and she hadn't been happy when she received an anonymous letter clearly sent from his current paramour, the one she wouldn't let him read, the one she burned and cried over for days.

Fuck. He'd fucked up.

But Miss Granger…

She knew none of that.

She knew his past to some extent, sure, everyone did. She'd seen him in the Department of Mysteries, first calmly requesting the Prophecy, then fighting members of the Order until Sirius was dead and the others began to retreat, their mission a failure. She'd seen him in Malfoy Manor, wandless and pathetic, when his wife and son tried to subdue her friends after she had been tortured by Bellatrix in their drawing room, a sight he would never forget. And she'd once witnessed fisticuffs between him and that dreadful Arthur Weasley, plus she'd seen him, haggard looking and somber, at the end of the Final Battle, when, like everyone else, his family gathered in the Great Hall.

How could she have seen so much, and still be interested?

Maybe Severus was right about one thing. Maybe there was something wrong with _him._ Maybe, if he were a decent man, he'd keep his distance.

But maybe he was not a decent man.

He wondered if she'd read trial transcripts, same as Severus Snape, after the war. She seemed like the type who would. If so, she must know about his impassioned plea for mercy, his claims that his family had no choice, that he, like his wife, was only trying to protect his son. He wondered if she believed it. He wondered whether Narcissa believed it.

A loud and most unpleasant SPLASH not only shook Lucius free from his own thoughts, it sent a wave of water over his face that nearly drowned him. He sputtered and swore and flailed until he'd reached a place where he could stand and keep his head above water.

Draco surfaced, laughing.

"Has something addled your brain, son? What was the meaning of that?"

"Just having a bit of fun, Father." Draco splashed him. "As you should, once in awhile."

"I have fun," Lucius snapped. He dipped his head under the water to slick his hair back from his face. "Are you home early?"

"They let us all leave early today. It's my boss's birthday. And I came straight here, to talk to you."

"To me? Why?"

Draco swam over to him with long, fluid strides and he couldn't help glaring jealously at the boy's form. He was the spitting image of his father at that age, toned but not overly so, with a full head of silky hair, a strong jaw, unblemished skin, a wrinkle-free forehead, and enough chest hair to make him look like a man but not enough to make him look like a beast… (Lucius subconsciously scratched between his pecs, where the thick hair that receded from his head seemed to have migrated).

"There is a witch I've developed somewhat of an interest in," he said, a little too formally, giving his father the impression he was trying to seem as confident as he secretly was insecure. "I am trying to gauge whether she is similarly interested in me, but Mother's advice backfired spectacularly."

"You took your mother's advice?" Lucius let out an undignified snort. "Serves you right for having it backfire. What did she tell you to do? Trivial things like candy and flowers? She has no idea."

"Not candy and flowers, but-"

"If you want a witch to show interest in you, all you need to do is feign interest in another."

Draco slammed himself face first into the pool. Lucius waited, bemused, for him to resurface.

"What?"

"That's what Mother said to do! That's what backfired! Now she thinks I have a girlfriend and she doesn't want to come between us?"

"A girlfriend? Your mother said to tell the witch you have a girlfriend?"

"No, she said to-"

"You don't pretend to have a girlfriend, you dolt. You pretend another woman is pursuing you and that you're mildly interested. That you find her advances flattering and you think she may be worth taking to bed. You don't make her your girlfriend!"

Draco splashed his father. "That didn't work!"

Lucius splashed him back. "That always works!"

Draco sent more water his way. "Not with this witch!"

Lucius did the same. "With every witch!"

"You!" (splash) "Are!" (splash) "No!" (splash) "Help!"

"Splash me one more time and the next time I speak with your mother, it will be to apologize for drowning her only son."

Draco couldn't fight a grin. "Drowning me? You couldn't even catch me."

"Of course I could." Lucius jutted up his chin the most dignified manner he could manage while soaking wet and up to his mid-chest in water. "I am in peak physical form."

"Are you? Mother says otherwise." Draco did not know why exactly he was goading his father, but he was certainly having fun doing it. He laughed. "You could no sooner drown me than you could coax her back into bed with-"

"I could drown you, bring you back to a tortured half-life as an Inferi, and then drown you again." Lucius' jaw was set. He glared at Draco, but there was a playful glean in his eye. When the boy was younger, he and his parents often played games like this, teasing each other, chasing each other in the pool. It had been a long time. "As for coaxing your mother into bed, she'll be aching for my comfort after I tell her of the great loss she suffered in your demise."

"I'd like to see you try, old man." Draco splashed him again, this time getting him full in the face with a wave of water.

Lucius leapt for him, missed, and landed face first. He turned this into a butterfly stroke, chasing Draco the length of the pool. The boy evaded capture better now than he had as a youth, and it wasn't long before Lucius was breathless, leaning against the edge of the pool in the shallow end, his hair a tangled sopping mess.

Draco tossed back his own hair and laughed. He did not seem to be struggling at all to breathe. Damn twenty-somethings and their limitless energy.

"Now that I've made my point, I want real advice. This witch isn't like the desperate slags and vapid bints you used to chase – or the ones that chased you. She's brilliant. She likes conversation and told her friend she's seeking 'a real connection,' whatever that means. She's also seeing someone casually, someone she's only interested in physically, someone too old for her. She won't tell me much about him, but I think she might like him more than she lets on, because she was sniffing some letter he wrote her after she received it during lunch break today. How do I win her?"

"How do you win her? You could always throw her in a pool and dare her to try to drown you. Should she fail, she owes you a date."

Draco snickered. "Yes, Father, I'm sure that will work swimmingly."

"Swimmingly." Lucius rolled his eyes. "Fine. Give me twenty minutes to shower off and dress and I'll meet you in the library for a drink. On one condition."

"What's that?"

"In exchange, I want advice from you on how to handle my lady friend. She is… younger… and I am a bit… out of touch… in regards to what younger women want. I will share with you my techniques for discerning a woman's interest – and increasing that interest, if necessary – and you will give me a brief tutorial on all that is popular with witches in your generation. Fair?"

Draco dove under the water and swam like a dolphin until he was in front of his father. He popped up and held out his hand to shake. "Deal."

* * *

 **A/N:**

I know this chapter was a little more serious than the previous ones, but I hope you enjoy it anyway! Thanks to everyone who has been reading and reviewing and adding to favorites and/or following! First lemon coming up in the next chapter! :D

 **-AL**


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N:**

 **A little more head-hopping in this chapter. I wanted to write the entire fic without ever showing Hermione's thoughts except through dialogue but then a mini-scene would not get out of my head and even though it made the chapter super long… well… you'll see.**

 **Also, fair warning, there _is_ a lemon at the end of this chapter. I tried to toe the line between funny and smutty, which wasn't easy (for me), so I hope you enjoy!**

 **-AL**

 **PS: please excuse typos, should you find any. My vision is very bad my glasses have gone missing, and I have to type directly into the document manager, which means I can't read what I've written. If you find any, please PM me. :)**

* * *

 **CHAPTER TEN**

 _ **"I beg..."**_

 **-Adele**

Lucius gave Draco advice.

Draco gave Lucius advice.

Neither gave the other a name.

"My lady friend," Lucius said. Several times.

"This witch I fancy," Draco said. Several times.

Still, it was quite probably the best father/son chat the two had ever had, and when they parted ways, both felt loads better than they had just a couple of hours earlier.

Meanwhile, in Hogsmeade, Severus Snape was chatting up Hermione Granger. Or, at least, it _felt like_ she was being chatted up.

"So, Miss Granger," he said, leaning too-casually against the bookshop wall between the MYSTERY and MYTHOLOGY sections. "Any significant wizards in your life at the present?"

"Er... no?" She had been happy to run into him and say hello, as she respected the man for what he'd done during the war and since, but this was weird.

"No?" His eyebrows rose nearly to his hairline. "You haven't developed an interest in…say... _older men_ … since the demise of your relationship with Mr. Weasley?"

"I... Uh..." Why was he asking? They were cordial but they certainly weren't friends, and besides, this wasn't even a topic she broached with most of her friends as of late. Hermione inhaled sharply. He'd asked about her interest in 'older men.' Could he know about Lucius – or, worse, was he asking for himself?

"I realize you are a woman now," he said smoothly, one elbow propped atop a short bookcase under a sign labeling the contents TOP READS OF THE MONTH. (Somehow, by trying to appear nonchalant, he instead gave the impression he was not a man but an alien wearing human clothing for the first time, trying desperately to fit in… and failing.) "And being a woman comes with certain... perks..."

"A woman, sir?"

"Yes. You've grown into… an attractive… woman…" It looked as though it was difficult for him to say it. "And I realize you may be looking to shed your 'Miss Perfect' persona, perhaps branching out into… _riskier_ territory? Seeking an older wizard for… _nefarious_ reasons? Attracted to the _dark_ and _dangerous,_ all you so carefully avoided in your youth…?"

She crinkled her nose. "What do you mean?"

"I believe you know what I mean, Miss Granger." He dropped the elbow, leaning close, staring intensely down at her, imposing. "Have you developed a sudden and questionable interest in older men? Are you currently seeking one… romantically?"

Her cheeks went pink. Should she tell him she was flattered but not interested?

"Sir, I'm sorry, but..."

Their eyes met and his widened. She got the distinct impression he'd just seen into her mind via unintentional Legilimency, and he didn't like what he found.

"Sir, I-"

"I am merely _curious_ , Miss Granger!" he snapped, and she flinched.

"Yes, sir, of course, I didn't think... I only thought... I didn't... I only... You're not my type, sir, but if..."

"I have absolutely _no_ romantic interest in you _at all,_ Granger. Of this I can assure you!"

His eyes flashed. Her blush deepened.

 _Merlin's pants,_ now she'd insulted the poor man.

"Absolutely zero interest, and it would be unwise for you to think otherwise!"

He was clearly backtracking to save face, and she felt simply awful about it.

"I am so sorry. You're a fine person, Professor Snape, but I'm currently seeing-"

"A mental health healer, I hope!"

"What? No! I..."

"You should proceed with caution, Miss Granger." He took a long, slow breath, steadying himself. "I do not think you are prepared for what lies ahead, in regards to the wizard you are 'currently seeing.' Use that impressive brain of yours to mull over the repercussions of your actions and ask yourself whether this is something you truly want to do."

"Turning you down, you mean?"

"Turning me... No!" His face went purple again. "As I've already unequivocally stated, I have _no romantic interest_ in you. I am merely looking out for your emotional well-being, as one who is older and wiser and with more life experience. War has addled greater minds than yours, and-"

"With all due respect, I do not believe my mind is _addled,_ sir." She chewed her lip, wondering whether her next words would be met with a huff, a hex, or a hug. Well, maybe not a hug. But gratitude... "I have a friend, though, who might be _perfect_ for you, if you're interested. She's a lovely woman who works in the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office..."

"I AM NOT TROLLING FOR A DATE, MISS GRANGER!" Severus' eyes swept the room. Hermione's gaze followed. They could see only four other customers in the book shop, plus one proprietor, and they all had their attention on the potions master and his former student. "And if I were, _you_ would not be the token of my affections, I assure you!"

"I... sir, I..." Goodness, she must have really hurt his feelings, for him to fly off the broom handle like this. "I'm sorry, Professor."

"This conversation was a mistake. I insist you forget it post-haste and never mention it to anyone." He turned, sweeping his traveling cloak dramatically over his shoulder. "Good afternoon."

And, without awaiting her goodbye, he stalked out of the shop.

Hermione stared after him, stunned.

The book shop proprietor, a squat, friendly-faced woman with long gray hair, hurried over to Hermione. She put her hand on her arm and handed her a book: How to Land a Wizard: A Thinking Witch's Guide.

"He's not the one for you, my dear," said the woman, giving her a comforting squeeze. "Trust me, you'll find someone."

"I... no, I don't need..." Hermione tried to give the book back.

"It's a gift," said the old woman insistently, smiling with kind eyes. "You'll be alright. There are other Grindylows in the sea."

"Thank you," said Hermione weakly, feeling ridiculous. She hoped the Prophet wouldn't hear about this. If they reported she'd been dumped by Severus Snape in a Hogsmeade book shop she'd simply die of embarrassment... and she could only imagine what Harry or Ron or Draco or Ginny would say. Or, worse still, Lucius.

"Severus has always been a surly man." A woman stepped from between the stacks, one neither Hermione nor the potions master had seen during their little... discussion. She was tall and slender and blonde and beautiful and Hermione immediately felt both intimidated and uncomfortable... and she wished she knew Occlumency, because this particular woman could read minds like no other, at least according to her son.

"I didn't mean to upset him," said Hermione. She hugged the Witch's Guide to her chest. "I think I'll write a letter to apologize."

"It was a misunderstanding, I'm sure." Narcissa looked her over discerningly, which made the hairs on Hermione's arms stand on end. "You're friends with my son."

"Yes."

"You hated each other in school."

"School feels like a very long time ago." Hermione forced a smile. "It's nice to see you, Mrs. Malfoy, but I'm afraid I have to be going..."

"Let's go for tea." Narcissa wrapped her hand around Hermione's bicep, her talons ever-so-slightly digging into the soft flesh. "I'll be up-front. I'm concerned about Draco, and I seek to pump you for information. Come along. We'll go to Madam Puddifoot's. I'll treat."

Hermione inhaled sharply. She wanted absolutely nothing less than to have tea with the mother of her friend, the wife - _wife!_ \- of the man she was seriously considering going to bed with, but she was not quick enough with an excuse and before she managed to come up with one, they were standing outside the tearoom.

"Are you afraid of me, Miss Granger?" Narcissa side-eyed her smoothly. They couldn't be more different, standing side by side. Hermione glanced at their reflections in the tearoom windows.

She was still wearing what she'd worn to work, an off-white blouse with a small mustard stain on the right cuff, a pleated gray skirt, sensible black shoes with a low heel. Her hair was pulled back into a messy bun in which she'd stuck her wand, a quill, and a pencil, and her makeup was simple - concealer, mascara, untinted Chapstick.

Narcissa, on the other hand, was the personification of dignity and class, in a form-fitting but flowy mauve fashionable witch's robe fastened over her abdomen with a silver clasp, under which she wore a pale pink floor-length dress, heels, makeup expertly applied to look like she wasn't wearing makeup, and jewelry that probably cost more than Hermione made in a year.

Luckily, life was not a fashion contest, or Hermione would be losing. Narcissa guided the younger witch into the tearoom, where they were immediately seated, while Hermione contemplated her reply.

She puffed up her chest, reminding herself while she may not be a fashion plate, she was _Hermione bloody Granger,_ a brilliant witch who'd been instrumental in taking down Lord Voldemort, top of her year all through Hogwarts, and an incredible inspiration for younger Muggleborn witches... according to the Prophet, anyway. She therefore answered the question with a bit of ice in her voice, her back straight and chin jutted out.

"Mrs. Malfoy, I wasn't afraid of you two and a half years ago when you were watching your sister torture me on the floor of your drawing room, and I'm not afraid of you today."

"Now, now, none of that." Narcissa forced a smile and patted Hermione's forearm in a placating way. Hermione placed her hands in her lap, folded, and regarded the older woman coolly.

"None of what? It's the truth."

"But why bring up that… that little _incident?_ We're simply having tea and a friendly chat, a girls' afternoon. Let's not dwell on the bad times." Narcissa pat her arm once more and sat back on her poofy seat, smiling more warmly now. When the witch working the tearoom came over, Narcissa ordered for both of them; she was like her husband in that way, commanding and commandeering, not bothering to ask her companion's preferences before making a decision.

"Why did you want to speak with me?"

"Miss Granger, Hermione - if I may call you Hermione?" (She did not wait for permission.) "My Draco is a good boy. I hope you do not hold the past against him as you do me."

"I know he's a good person," said Hermione defensively. "He's my friend."

"I'm glad he's your friend." Narcissa leaned forward, reaching for her hand. "Genuinely."

"Thanks?"

"Are you seeing someone?"

"I…" Hermione inwardly panicked. Why was everyone so interested in her love life all of a sudden? Did Narcissa know what was going on? Had Lucius told her? Not that much was even going on, so what was there to tell? They'd never even kissed, unless one counted his chaste pecks on her cheek, temple, and back of her hand. Hermione tried to both think quickly and keep her mind closed, just in case.

"Is this about Professor Snape? Because I wasn't trying to-"

"Oh, dear, no!" Narcissa chuckled. "It was clear you weren't interested in Severus, nor was he interested in you. That was merely a misunderstanding, as I said. A rather amusing one for me, as an outsider. But I believe he may think someone we both know is interested in you…"

Merlin. She must know. This couldn't be good.

"We're friends and that's all!" Hermione jumped up. "I'm terribly sorry, Mrs. Malfoy, but I've just remembered an engagement and if I don't leave now, I'll be late. Perhaps we could have tea another day? I'm so sorry to rush off…"

"Another engagement?" Narcissa looked… disappointed? "I wouldn't want to make you late…"

"Thank you for understanding. Give my regards to... to Draco. Good afternoon."

She swept from the tearoom faster than Severus Snape had the bookshop, and she left behind How to Land a Wizard: A Thinking Witch's Guide. Narcissa picked it up and ran her fingertips over the cover. Perhaps a little light reading was in her future... and she could call upon the girl again to return the tome, that would make for a marvelous excuse to drop by. If only she knew where Hermione lived.

"What happened there?" asked the waitressing witch, as she set a pot down on Narcissa's table. Narcissa sighed, set down the book, and gestured for her to sit. The witch glanced around. None of her customers seemed to need her at the moment, and she'd known the Black sisters since they attended school together, they'd all been friends, so she figured there was no harm in taking a moment. Once she was seated, Narcissa explained.

"I am _certain_ my son fancies her, but for some odd reason he's being cagey about it, not coming clean with me, and not making a move. I think he's afraid of rejection – it's not something he's exactly used to – which breaks my heart for him. I was hoping to gauge whether she feels the same so I could better figure out how to advise him, but she rushed off so quickly…" Narcissa reached for her teacup. "She doesn't seem to like me much, Mildred. Not that she should, we have a difficult history. But all I want is for my darling Draco to be happy, and if she's what will make him happy…" Narcissa reached into her small handbag for a pack of cigarettes.

"Oh that _is_ complicated," said Mildred, tutting. "Speaking of complications, last time you were here you told me you were afraid it might be over with Lucius?"

Narcissa nodded, now looking quite miserable, as she brought a cigarette up to her lips. "I think he's seeing someone. I've no idea who she might be, but he's looking better, getting out of the Manor… smiling… I don't know. He couldn't manage to clean himself up and smile for _me_ , but…" She lit the end, breathed in, and let out a little puff of smoke. "Marriages aren't meant to last forever, are they?"

"Aren't they?"

Narcissa shrugged one shoulder. Her lower lip trembled, as did the hand holding the cigarette, but her voice was steady when she spoke again.

"I told him I couldn't spend the rest of my life waiting to start the rest of my life. I truly thought going out, meeting other wizards, showing him… showing Lucius, giving him… I thought a reminder of what we once had, what he could lose, I thought..." She took a long drag and let the smoke out slowly. "I thought what I was doing would propel him to action. Make him jealous, make him feel… anything. You can't know how frustrating it was, cooped up in that Manor with him for all that time, watching him pout and whine and waste away. He didn't care about me, he didn't care about himself..." Another drag. "I was going mad, I had to get out. And it was fun, at first, the freedom. But now…"

"Now that he might have found someone else?"

Narcissa nodded. "Now it just hurts."

"I'm sure she's nothing special." Mildred squeezed her old friend's hand. "A placeholder. A poor substitution for you. He'll come to his senses. They always do."

"But I've waited so long," whispered Narcissa, clasping Mildred's hand between her own. "And what if he _doesn't_?"

Hours later, Draco and Hermione were curled up on her couch watching the week's black and white classic romance, Bringing Up Baby.

"Muggles are mad," he said, pointing at the pet leopard on the screen. "I'd rather try to tame a blast-ended skrewt. Did all the actors escape unscathed?"

"I'm sure it's a _trained_ leopard." Hermione giggled. "Can you imagine a leopard at Hogwarts? Good thing Hagrid doesn't watch movies. They might give him ideas."

They ate popcorn and drank butterbeer, as usual, and all through the picture Draco contemplated how he was going to come right out and tell Hermione how he was feeling, even though his father's advice had been to make her come to him (and he'd told his son exactly how to do so). In the dark, on her couch, under an afghan, it no longer seemed like the sound advice he'd thought it was that afternoon after the pool.

The movie ended and they cleaned up, bringing their dishes to the kitchen.

"Thanks Draco." Hermione hugged him. "I… I hope this isn't uncomfortable, but I'd really like us to go to dinner sometime…"

His heart leapt.

"On a double date. I want to meet Mary Sue. She sounds perfect. And I want you to meet my… the man I'm seeing… but I'm afraid you won't approve, and I don't want to jeopardize our friendship in any way. It really means a lot to me. _You_ mean a lot to me. What do you think?"

"Mary Sue?" He sighed. "I'll ask her. But…" His father had suggested sowing the seeds of discontent there with the hope of gaining sympathy, but doing so carefully so as not to look like he was about to get dumped. "I don't know that we'll be together much longer. She and I see the world differently, and I feel she might be happier with someone she can better relate to. I don't want to play the martyr by breaking it off with her for her own good, but at the same time, it may be the best for everyone. Especially as I think I may be falling for someone else."

"Oh, no!" Hermione seemed wounded by this revelation. "Poor sweet Mary Sue! Are you sure? You can't work it out? Maybe you're selling yourself short, if you think she'd be happier with someone else. I mean, you're wonderful and she's wonderful – don't give up now! I really _do_ want to meet her!"

It was as if she hadn't even heard the bit about falling for someone else.

He fought the urge to roll his eyes.

"We're going out of the country tomorrow, she and I, to France for the weekend. There, we'll have a long talk." (He could break up with the nonexistent Canadian then, but by giving them a place to be he could avoid her suggesting the foursome meet up tomorrow night.) "Could we get a bite after work Monday? I'd like to get a woman's perspective afterward."

"Of course!" She hugged him again. "I just want you to be happy, Draco. Like your mother said."

"My mother said what?"

Hermione froze. "I… your mother wants you to be happy, doesn't she? Hasn't she said that?"

"I suppose."

"All mothers say that." She beamed. "Well… I'll see you Monday, then?"

"Monday. At work, and then, after. Right." He left without another hug, without telling her the truth, and without making her chase him. Another failed night.

At least the movie had been good.

The following evening, while Draco and "Mary Sue" were having their "long talk," Hermione was out to dinner with Lucius Malfoy.

"Your wife doesn't know about us at all? Not a thing?"

"Not a thing!" he insisted. "She and I hardly speak and when we do, it's hardly in the form of heart-to-heart chats. Besides…" He placed his hand over hers atop the table. "My heart is elsewhere, as of late."

This was Draco's advice. When dealing with younger women, women of his generation, be direct. Witches in their twenties don't like to play games as Lucius' generation did. They appreciate honesty, directness, a true connection… all of the things Draco himself was not yet able to bring to the table as far as Hermione was concerned.

"Do you fancy me then?" Hermione asked.

His thumb traced circles in the space between her thumb and forefinger. Slate eyes met cinnamon brown.

"The first time I took you to brunch, I was merely looking for absolution and to lessen the loss of your book. But now…"

"Why?"

"You're…" He was going to say, 'Not like other witches,' but then remember Draco saying young women hate that line. He went, therefore, with more specificity and hoped it wouldn't backfire. "You're quite unlike my wife. I hope you won't find this off-putting, but after decades with one woman, it's refreshing to get to know someone who is her polar opposite. You read and discuss ideas, you have a brilliant mind, I can talk to you. You're beautiful, but in a natural way, not because you spend hours carefully crafting a mask, cultivating an image… You're… real."

She smiled, a smiled that went from her lips to her eyes and coursed through her entire body; he felt it when she turned over her hand to hold his.

"I find both your mind and body inexplicably attractive, and please reprimand me if necessary, but I would like to get to know both better."

Her cheeks went pink in a sweet, delighted sort of way, and he fought the urge to smirk. Damn, he was good.

Not that it was all lies. He did find both her mind and body attractive… but it wasn't her mind he was hoping to get into bed.

She was a tad tipsy by the end of dinner, but not obnoxiously so. She stumbled a little on her heels, so he offered to walk her home from the apparition point.

"I'd rather not stay at my home tonight," she said, blinking up at him, her eyes darkening.

"Then where shall I put you to bed? You've been drinking."

"You could take me to bed rather than putting me to it," she said.

He felt a tug in his lower abdomen… but nothing further below, where an interest should have been awakening.

"But Draco-"

"Is away for the weekend, in Paris with his girlfriend."

"Girlfriend?" He nodded approvingly, surprised but impressed. It seemed his advice to the boy must have worked, then, if yesterday his intended paramour was seeing someone else but today she was his girlfriend and they were away together. "In that case…" He wrapped his arm securely around her waist, bringing her to his chest. Her eyes closed and he apparated them to Malfoy Manor.

They weren't even through the door when she was on him like a starving cheetah on an antelope. Her mouth met his and he kissed back just as hungrily, one hand on her arse, the other trying to close and ward-lock the door. (Where was a fucking house-elf when he needed one?)

He apparated them from the hall to his bedroom, just in case Draco's plans for Paris had fallen through, and as soon as she was steady on her feet she was making quick work of the buttons on the front of his Muggle dress shirt. Her hair was wild, her eyes wilder, and though he did momentarily consider that perhaps the alcohol was more responsible for this sudden change than he wanted to believe, he wasted no time hiking up her dress to palm her arse over silk knickers.

That tightening in his lower abdomen happened again, but, still, nothing stirred in his pants. Merlin's bloody ball sack, _why_?! He had an attractive, much younger, clearly ready to fuck woman attempting to unfasten his belt, and… nothing?

It didn't seem fair.

He grabbed her wrist.

"Miss Granger – Hermione – you've been drinking. I do not make it a habit of taking advantage of women when they're pissed."

( _Good job Lucius,_ he mentally congratulated himself. _You can get out of this by being a gentleman, impressing her with your level of respect rather disappointing her with your lack of erection_.)

"I only had three glasses of wine. I'm a little…" She fell off her heel again, then kicked off her shoes altogether. "I'm not drunk by any stretch of the imagination. I've been thinking about this for weeks now. I've never in my life had decent sex, not the kind my girlfriends talk about, and I think, if anyone can provide, it will be you." Her hands again went to his belt buckle. "Sir."

This could not possibly get any worse for him.

"Very well," he said. He lifted her and carried her to the bed, depositing her in the center. "But I do not leap into bed with just anyone, nor am I one to devour my pudding before I've enjoyed the main course." He moved midway down the bed, parted her legs, and pressed a kiss to her inner thigh. "And what sort of man would I be if I started a meal without first sampling the appetizer?"

If he could get her off and leave her sated and exhausted by other means, she might not even notice his failure to follow-through, especially as, at that point, he could play if off like a favor – "My intention tonight was to bring you as much pleasure as possible, while denying myself, as, contrary to public opinion, I am not a selfish man…" – Yes, it was a good plan.

She inhaled, one hand on her abdomen, the other clutching the pristine white blanket under her, as he moved up her body with all the stealth and suavity of a panther… or a leopard.

"It occurs to me I've never even properly kissed you, Hermione Granger."

"Prop-?"

His lips silenced her word.

The kiss was tender, gentle, not at all what she thought he'd be capable of. Though both their lips were slightly parted, he made no immediate attempt to deepen it. She sighed against his mouth, a sigh of pleasure, and he took that as his cue to draw her lower lip between his own. He ran his tongue along it, eliciting another quiet gasp from her, and then his tongue was slipping in against hers, exploring…

She arched her back as she returned the kiss. His tongue tasted of chocolate soufflé, hers of the red wine. She moaned when his hand went to her breast, caressing over the sheer fabric of her dress, under which she'd forgone a bra.

"Perfection," he murmured against her mouth as the pad of his thumb found her hardening nipple.

Her hands threaded up into his hair, which was loose tonight, soft and silky and smelling like sandalwood shampoo. She guided him into another kiss.

"You've never had decent sex?" he asked. The hand on her breast squeezed and she moaned in response. With his other hand he gently caressed her face, cupping her cheek, running his thumb along her puffy, moistened bottom lip.

"Never."

"We mustn't rush things, then. Decent sex, Miss Granger, is about far more than intercourse. Some of the best sex I've had hasn't involved penetration at all, as a matter of fact."

"N-no?" She'd shivered when he'd called her Miss Granger. She ran her hands up his bare chest, pushing the shirt off his shoulders. His pecs were firm and smooth. She longed to press her lips to them.

"No." He moved onto his side, beside her, and ran his fingertips up and down her arm. "Decent sex is as much about what's happening in your head as it is what's happening between your legs. Perhaps more mental than physical. If the men you've been with haven't managed to satisfy you accordingly, it is likely because they are focusing here…" He squeezed her breast again. "Or here…" He moved his hand to her arse. "Or here…" He slipped one hand between her legs over her knickers. She was already wet, and he cursed the gods of every religion that even this failed to make him hard. He massaged her pussy through the fabric with his palm as he continued. "A man can kiss you, lick you, suck your tits and fuck your quim and slap your arse, but if he hasn't first excited you here…" He moved his hand to her forehead, drawing a little X with the pad of his thumb. "You'll not fully appreciate the experience any place else."

"I need this," she whimpered, her pelvis tilting up involuntarily. She felt like a schoolgirl acting out a naughty fantasy, and she also felt slightly pathetic for her willingness to beg, but already he was making a greater impression upon her entire body than Krum or Ollie or Ron ever had.

"One step at a time, Miss Granger. Hermione."

He kissed her briefly, tenderly, on the lips. She pressed back, seeking more, but he pulled away.

"I'm going to undress you now," he said. "And I am going to look at you. And I want you to be looking, too." He gestured at the ceiling. She looked past his shoulder and gasped. A mirror was above them, a mirror that showed everything. Had he just made it appear using wandless magic, or had it always been there?

"Keep your eyes on your reflection and keep your attention focused on my voice," he said, and she got literal chills. He kissed one corner of her mouth, then the other. She maintained eye contact with herself as he reached under her body to unzip the dress, which he slowly pulled off over her head. "You need an intellectual equal, Hermione. You need someone who will indulge you your fantasies, no matter how dark or depraved…" She shivered again. His hands went to the front clasp of her bra. When it popped open, he removed it as she had his shirt, by running his hands over her chest pushing it off to the sides. Once completely divested of it, he dropped it to the floor beside the bed on top of her dress.

"Kiss me," he ordered. Her mouth met his. He nipped at her lower lip before pulling away to give another order.

"Arch your back."

She obeyed, but closed her eyes.

"Look at yourself."

She opened her eyes.

"These breasts…" He ran his hand from her hip up to rest under the left one. "Are beautiful, and deserving of attention." He laved his tongue over her nipple, then sucked it into his mouth. "There one of your favorite features, aren't they? You like the way they look, the size, the color of your areolas, this lovely dark pink…" He flicked his tongue over the hardened pebble in the center. "You like to touch them when you touch yourself, don't you?"

"I… yes," she confessed. "I like them."

"Show me how you touch them, Hermione." He jerked his head toward the ceiling mirror. "Show yourself."

She took one in each hand and squeezed, then rubbed her palms over her nippled, feeling awkward.

"No, no, no." He took her hands in his and pressed a kiss to each palm. "Don't do what you think I want to see. Show me what feels good."

This time she licked her thumbs and rubbed them over the pebbles before plucking one hard between her thumb and forefinger. She had to turn her head to avoid watching herself, but at the same time a flush of warmth pooled between her legs.

"Show me." His hand rested on her lower abdomen, caressing her there above the band of her knickers. "Show me what feels good."

"This feels good," she said, doing it again.

"Yes?" He leaned down to again flick his tongue over her nipple, then draw it into his mouth, sucking harder than anyone ever had before. She let out a sound that was somewhere between a whimper and a moan, and one of her hands went to the back of his head, encouraging him to continue. He moved from one to the other, doing the same, as she scratched at the back of his neck. Her body thrust against him of its own accord, and when she opened her eyes again she could see in her reflection flushed cheeks and swollen lips.

"Tell me…" He placed slow, sweet kissed along her shoulders, to her neck, and stopped to suck the skin there. His tongue ran along the shell of her ear, and he spoke again in a low, husky voice. "Tell me what you need."

"I need you to touch me."

"I am touching you." He applied pressure to her abdomen. She groaned.

"Touch me… lower…"

"Here?" He moved his entire body midway down the bed, taking hold of her ankles. He ran his hands up and down her smooth, hairless thighs. "Touch you here?"

"No, higher, please, higher!" she cried out, wriggling and squirming. He kept himself from grinning, keeping it cool, but damn – this was easier than expected. He was going to have her orgasming before he'd even removed her knickers.

"Let me move higher. You watch the mirror."

She forced her eyes open.

He kissed her ankle bone, first one, then the other. He went up her right left first, leaving a trail of kisses all the way to her inner thigh. He pushed her legs further apart and sucked at the tender skin, not hard enough to leave a mark, but hard enough that she called out begging her to bite him.

"Hard, there, please!"

He chuckled.

"My teeth are not what you need right now, Hermione Granger. There will be plenty of time to take the fangs out later, if you so desire."

He breathed deeply when passing her center, but ultimately neither touched nor kissed her there, choosing instead to move back down the other leg. He let his teeth scrape briefly against her calf.

"Please, please, touch me…"

"I _am_ touching you."

She moved one hand down between her legs and began massaging her clit through the silk fabric. He caught her wrist and returned her hand to her breast.

"No, not yet. Tell me what you like, Miss Granger."

His lips moved again to her inner thigh. He grasped the sides of her knickers and began to pull them slowly, slowly down over her arse….

"Do you want to be dominated, spanked, tied down, fucked hard? Do you want to grind your pussy against the mattress while I take you from behind, riding you until your limbs give out? Should I bite the back of your shoulder and pull your hair and make you scream my name?"

 _"Oh, fuck…"_

The knickers reached her ankles. He removed them, tossing them to the floor, and moved up over her body, not making physical contact, though she could feel his breath on her skin.

"Or would you rather be pampered? Held in my arms, covered in soft kisses accented by a gentle caress? Should I lick you until you're crying to be filled? Should I be on top, claiming you for my own, sucking on your breasts and touching you with just my fingertips, making you shiver?"

 _"Oh… fuck… fuck!"_

"What shall I whisper in your ear?" He brushed against her mons with the back of his pointer finger, carefully avoiding the place she wanted him to touch most. "Do you want me to tell you how beautiful you are, how brilliant, how enviable you are for your talent, how impressed I am by your intellect…"

She stared up at herself with wide, glassy eyes, parted her thighs even more, and prayed he would slip that sharp-and-tender tongue of his between her folds.

He continued to touch her with one hand, to touch her everywhere down there but _there_.

"Or would you rather I groan out your name as I thrust into you, taking from you what I need and giving to you what you've never had, pulling out of your hot core then plunging in again, fucking you over and over and over until my name is the only word that brilliant mind of yours can remember?"

 _"Please… Lucius… please…"_

He ran his thumb up one of her pussy lips and down the other, then slipped deeper to circle her clit, but still he refused to touch it directly. Her hips titled and she bit down hard on her lip.

"Or, perhaps, you could like to ride me. Sit in my lap, jump up and down, have all the control, let those lovely tits bounce teasingly in my face while I leave fingerprint bruises along your arse and hips and outer thighs. Would you like for me to kiss you?"

Finally, _finally_ his mouth made contact with her sex.

She hissed and twerked up against his mouth. His lips parted, his tongue darted in, fucking her, as his thumb went to her clit.

 _"Ohhh…."_

His fingers and tongue traded places. He licked and sucked and flicked his tongue against her clit while first one, then two fingers worked inside her, fucking her, making her hips buck. Just when her breathing became so erratic her words were coming out as indiscriminate sounds, just when he knew she was right there on the brink, he abruptly stopped licking her and, still fucking her with his fingers, moved up to kiss her on the mouth.

She could taste herself on his tongue, could see her naked, thrusting body in the mirror, could feel him pressing against that spongy spot inside she had difficulty finding for herself, and that was all her brilliant brain could take.

She exploded against him, a veritable volcano, hot and pulsating and dangerous.

She cried out several times and then she just cried.

"That was… that was…"

"I know." He kissed her cheek tenderly, feeling all-too pleased with himself. "You rest now."

"But I… but I…" She turned to him with tear-stained cheeks. "I didn't do anything for you."

"Enjoying you was quite enough for me for one night."

She was exhausted and sated and didn't even question why he wasn't now fucking her into oblivion – mission accomplished! – as her eyelids drooped.

He moved the blanket and top sheet from under them to over them, removed his belt, trousers, socks, and shoes, and curled up behind her. It had been far too long since he last fell asleep spooned behind a woman, and he'd missed it. He kissed her shoulder and then the back of her neck and whispered goodnight, but she was already out.

"Nice work, old man," he complimented himself, trying not to dwell on the fact that finding a young woman willing to fuck him into tomorrow hadn't cured his little 'excitement problem.' Maybe Narcissa was right. Maybe he needed to see a Healer.

But not now. For now, he could close his eyes and sleep peacefully.

He only hoped Draco was faring so well in Paris with his paramour.


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N:**

Word of warning, the last chapter was very long, but this one is very short.

Please don't be cross! The next one will be posted soon, I promise.

Thanks for reading!

 **-AL**

* * *

 **CHAPTER ELEVEN**

 ** _"Regrets and mistakes..."_**

 **-Adele**

Narcissa couldn't find her favorite crimson scallop cut dress anywhere. After tearing her entire home apart, she realized it must be one of too many items left behind at Malfoy Manor, in the large wardrobe beside the one holding Lucius' clothes in their bedroom. His bedroom.

She gained easy access to the Manor, took the stairs quickly, and did not bother to knock when she reached the master bedroom. Given the early hour, she assumed he would be sound asleep. She could slip in, grab her dress, and slip back out without him being any the wiser.

Unless she lost her head entirely and slipped into bed with him.

"Don't start thinking like that, Cissy," she scolded herself, her hand on the knob. She opened the door.

She entered.

He was indeed in bed.

But he was not alone.

Less than twelve hours earlier, Draco, who had no reason to go to Paris given girlfriend Mary Sue's lack of existence, decided to throw a small, impromptu pool party. He invited only Blaise and the Greengrass sisters.

After a couple of hours of drinking champagne and eating shrimp cocktail and splashing each other and chatting, Blaise and Daphne went from cuddling on the steps to full on snogging, leaving Draco and Astoria eying each other awkwardly. The two had fooled around in the past, but that was a long time ago, and didn't she have a boyfriend, anyway?

"We broke up." She answered the question he hadn't asked aloud. "And I'm not looking for another relationship right now. But if you wanted to…" She tilted her head in the direction of her sister, who was now straddling Blaise, attached at the mouth.

He almost told her he couldn't, that he had a girlfriend, but then he realized how stupid that would sound. What girlfriend? Mary Sue, the one he was supposed to be breaking up with in Paris tonight, or Hermione, the one who had no idea he was even bloody interested and was probably in bed with some smarmy bloke at that very moment?

"Let's rinse off," he suggested. He pulled himself up onto the side of the pool, avoiding the love nest that had been the stairs, and led the way toward the shower. She followed.

And before he could further contemplate what he was about to do, they were under the steady stream of water, fondling each other over the bathing costumes… and then under their bathing costumes… and, then, finally, without wearing bathing costumes.

Daphne went home with Blaise.

Astoria didn't go home.

"Good morning, Lucius." Narcissa strode past the bed en route to the wardrobe. She'd gone several steps before she stopped, frozen.

"You should knock, Narcissa."

She slowly about-faced. "I had no idea you'd be… indisposed."

"I am quite the opposite of _indisposed_ , I assure you." He chuckled and stroked the bushy brown hair of the woman hiding her face in his neck.

"I thought you were lying about having a 'lady friend.' I see I was wrong."

"You were, indeed." He smiled smugly.

"And I thought your little problem in the bedroom was caused by something… something you couldn't cure without the help of a Healer, but now, I see I was wrong on that, too. All you needed was another woman."

"What little problem in the bedroom?" The witch huddled up to him pulled back slightly. "You haven't got a disease or-"

"Impotence isn't a disease, but its cause could be one," said Narcissa with a touch of viciousness.

"Impotence?" Hermione pulled back farther. "Is that why you didn't want to-"

"Narcissa!" he snapped, at the same time she said, "Granger!"

"Oh!" Hermione covered her face again, this time with the sheet.

"You're shagging Hermione Granger, of all witches?"

"What do you mean, 'of all witches'? Still carrying around some of that anti-Mudblood prejudice, dear?"

"Hardly! I can't even remember the last time I used the word Mudblood!"

"I can remember the last time someone used it to describe me in this house," came Hermione's muffled voice. "And on that note, I should go."

"No! You stay! You stay here and while Lucius is feeding you breakfast in bed – or whatever it is with the woman he takes home – I'll go comfort my son, because one of his parents needs to care about him!"

"What? Witch, what are you infer… Get back here!" He kissed Hermione on the temple and extricated himself from the bed, reaching for his dressing gown. He threw it on, tearing after his wife, who was already to the stairs. "What's this about Draco?"

"What's this about Draco? You… you… you horse's arse!"

"Is this because they're the same age?" Lucius tied the robe closed and reached for her upper arm, stopping her from taking another step.

"I suppose I never knew the depths of your depravity, Lucius Malfoy, now unhand me or I shall hex you into the next century!"

"What is going on out here?" Bleary eyed, Draco stumbled into the hall, wearing only his pajama bottoms. "The sun's barely up and you're already fighting?"

"Your mother seems to think my taking a woman to bed means I no longer care for your well-being!"

"You took a woman to-" Draco's face broke into a smile. "That's excellent news, Father!"

"See, Narcissa?" Lucius jerked his head toward the boy. "Excellent news! He's not cut up about it. Why are you?"

"He doesn't know who you've brought to bed!"

"What does he care? She's a friend of his, he'll be thrilled!"

"She's more than a friend, Lucius! He fancies her!"

Draco's smile slipped from his face. "Wait, who?"

"Fancies her? Hardly!" Lucius laughed, a loud, over-exaggerated laugh. "He has a girlfriend! Speaking of which, I thought you were headed to-"

"Draco? I am so sorry to… interrupt, but I have to go." Astoria exited Draco's bedroom, pulling her hair back with a ribbon. She was fully dressed. "I have to open the shop this morning, I completely forgot."

"Astoria?" Now Hermione was in the hall, also wearing the clothes she'd had on the night before. "Oh, Draco, you didn't! _Cheating_? What about Mary Sue?"

"Who?" asked Lucius, Astoria, and Narcissa at once.

"Draco's girlfriend! They're supposed to be in-"

"Paris!" Lucius picked up. "As I was saying, Draco quite happily has a girlfriend-"

"He doesn't have a girlfriend! He fancies _Hermione_ , you waste of oxygen and hair product!" Narcissa slapped Lucius in the center of his chest. He finally dropped her arm.

"Draco?" Hermione's voice sounded small, confused, concerned. Lucius, Narcissa, and Astoria also turned to look at the pale blond in his pajama bottoms. His mouth was open, his eyes were wide, and he appeared to have been Stunned or Petrified.

"Draco," whispered Hermione. "What about Mary Sue?"

"Mary Sue," Draco echoed. "I… I was supposed to go to Paris with Mary Sue."

"Who is Mary Sue?" asked Astoria. "What is going on here?"

The clock in the downstairs hall chimed.

"Oh, I'm going to be late! Draco, whatever this is, I'm sorry." Astoria kissed his cheek. "Let's talk soon!"

She took the stairs two at a time. No one moved, spoke, or even breathed until they heard the downstairs door slam shut.

"There is no Mary Sue, is there, Draco?" asked Narcissa gently, reaching for her son. He backed away, looking surprised when his back hit the wall.

"Tell them about her, Draco!" The pain in Hermione's voice was mirrored by that on her face. "Tell them about your girlfriend!"

"I didn't have sex with her," said Lucius, switching his gaze from his wife to his son and back again. "I couldn't."

"I don't fancy Hermione," said Draco, finally finding the words. "I never have. At most, she's been a friend, and now…" He glanced her up and down, his nose wrinkled as if she were dirty. "And now, not even that. Excuse me."

He returned to his bedroom and slammed the door.

"Draco!" cried Hermione.

"Son!" called Lucius.

"Let him be." Narcissa pressed her fingertips to her temples. "I'm sorry, Lucius. I won't barge in on you in your bedroom anymore. Nor will I enter Malfoy Manor without your permission in the future. I could do well to remember that this isn't my _home_." Her voice broke on the last word. "I'm sorry."

She turned and hurried down the stairs.

"Narcissa, wait!" Lucius followed her until the first landing, but she did not pause or glance back, and so he let her go. He cringed when the door slammed behind her, and despite the heavy oak and the space separating them, both he and Hermione heard her burst into sobs upon making her exit.

"Hermione." Lucius reached for her, but she pulled away.

"I'm sorry, Lucius." She rushed down the stairs to the door, hoping she could catch Narcissa before the woman reached the apparating point just beyond the gates.

"Hermione!" he called after her. "Please, don't go!"

"I have to!" She caught his eye over her shoulder as she wrenched open the heavy door. "I'm sorry."


	12. Chapter 12

**CHAPTER TWELVE**

 _ **"I had hoped you'd see my face**_  
 _ **And that you be reminded that for me it isn't over."**_

 **-Adele**

Hermione caught up with Narcissa just before the apparition point.

"Please, listen!" She reached for the woman's wrist, barely catching it as Narcissa swiveled on her heel.

"What could you possibly have to say to me?" Tears ran steadily down Narcissa's pale cheeks. "I'm sorry I interrupted you with my husband. I'm even more sorry the commotion I made drew my son into the hall, and I'm especially sorry I told you how he feels – For what it's worth, I'm certain he hates me in this moment as much as he does you and his father, so whatever you're feeling, know it can't possibly be half as bad as what I feel."

"Draco told me he had a girlfriend. Mary Sue. I've been on him for weeks about letting me meet her!"

"And my husband… have you been on _him_ for weeks, too?"

Hermione's mouth gaped. "I… I swear, I… He…"

"Don't." She swiped at her cheeks, brushing away the tears with her sleeve. "It doesn't matter. We've been living apart for ages. I've been seen out with… with _dozens_ of men since I left him… trying to get his attention… to… to force him to get help at risk of losing me… I even… I even slept with a few of them… and… it… hasn't… mattered… a bit!"

And with that, light crying gave way to full-on sobbing. She fell forward into Hermione's open arms and nestled into the slope before her shoulder, dampening her shirt with tears.

Confused but trying to be comforting, Hermione rubbed the elder woman's back and let her cry.

"Perhaps we could go somewhere and talk?" asked Hermione, when the woman had composed herself enough to stand up straight and breathe without hiccupping. "Maybe I can help. Please, just talk to me."

Narcissa was tempted to snap, "You've been enough help!" but something in the girl's honest, earnest expression stopped her, and to her surprise, she slowly nodded.

"Take my arm," said Narcissa, holding it out. "We'll apparate to my home."

Inside Malfoy Manor, Lucius was standing outside his son's bedroom door, knocking hard and threatening to get his wand if the boy didn't unlock it post-haste.

"Let me in!" he demanded. "Son, I must speak with you. I swear, I didn't have sex with her! She spent the night, but nothing of consequence happened! And I had no idea – I didn't know – I never would have…" He was growing desperate… and impatient. "Draco, open this door and face me like a man!"

The door flung open. Draco was dressed, his hair combed, and his face ruddy from having just been washed.

"We have nothing to talk about, Father. If you'd excuse me-"

"No, I'll not excuse you!"

Draco shoved past him anyway. Lucius followed him to, and then down, the stairs.

"Your mother made it sound as though you fancy Miss Granger, but I thought she was only your friend! You have a witch in mind, don't you? One you were supposed to have gone to Paris with? What was Astoria? What was she-"

"What was she doing here?" Draco, nearly to the bottom of the stairs, swiveled back to face his father, one hand gripping the bannister. His pale face contorted with cruel fury. "I was fucking her, Father, if you must know. Remember fucking? Your inability to do it is the reason Mother left us."

"You… you… I… you…" sputtered Lucius, the absolute indignity of this pushing anger to replace the deep regret he was feeling. "I'm not a bloody Seer, Draco! I'm not a Legilimens, like your mother! How was I supposed to know the witch you fancied was the swotty Mudblood?"

"What did you call her?" Draco whipped out his wand, pointing it up at his father.

"I didn't… I…" Lucius, though unafraid, genuinely felt remorseful for having upset his wife and son – and, to a lesser extent, Hermione – and he had no idea how he was going to fix this, but he supposed he ought to start with those two little words he hated to say more than any others in the entire English language. "I'm sorry."

"Aduro Capillum!" shouted Draco, waving his wand in just the right way. His father's long, beloved hair was momentarily set ablaze, then burnt out, leaving dead, brittle, ashy strands from just below his ears to the ends.

"Draco!" Lucius touched a clump, which then broke off and landed on the floor looking indistinguishable from fireplace soot. "My… my hair!"

"How does it feel, Father? Losing something you love?"

"My hair!"

"Your hair will grow back! Hermione won't!"

"Bloody… I… she's not dead, Draco! Unlike my hair! Oh, my hair."

Lucius thought he might cry. While he felt badly about those he had hurt, the fact was, he was hurting too. His relationship with Hermione, whatever it might have become, was over, his wife may have just walked out for the final time, and his only son was glaring at him with a hatred usually unseen in him unless someone brought up the Dark Lord.

Draco turned and hurried down the last couple of steps and exited quickly through the front door, headed to the apparition point. He had no idea where he'd be apparating too, and what's more, he didn't care, so long as it was far from here and no one would find him.

Lucius sat on the steps, staring at the closed front door, and held his face in his hands.

Everything had seemed so good only twelve hours ago.

How quickly everything had changed.

Meanwhile, it didn't take long for Narcissa to retain her elegance and grace upon arriving home. She stood up straighter, tossed her hair, lit a cigarette, and offered Hermione a glass of wine.

"It's a bit early, isn't it?" asked Hermione, turning down the offer of a drink.

"Juice, then?" Narcissa snapped her fingers, summoning a house-elf. "Get Miss Granger a tall glass of orange juice and a cup of coffee. I'll take coffee too. Go on."

The little elf bowed and disapparated to do so.

"Sit." Narcissa gestured toward one of her two favorite chairs. "You wanted to talk? We'll talk."

"Before we say anything else, I want to be clear – I did not have sex with your husband, and I had no idea Draco might be interested in me. I swear on my cat's life."

"Your cat?" Narcissa almost smiled. How ridiculous, to swear on the life of a fluffy fleabag. But the girl seemed genuine. "If you did not have sex with my husband, Miss Granger, why were you in bed with my husband?"

"I…" Her cheeks went pink. "I _asked_ him to have sex with me. I was a bit tipsy, you see, and lonely, and I've… I've never… _nevrhadgdsexbfr_."

"You've never _what_?"

Hermione took a breath and tried again. "I've never had good sex before. And he has a reputation, and he'd been so nice as of late, and I thought you two were over… It probably sounds awful of me, I'm sure you think I'm a slag, but he was being flirtatious and I was a bit tipsy and I thought… I thought maybe it would be… you know. Good. But we… we did a bit of… you know, this and that… and then he… didn't want to do more. Or maybe couldn't. I don't know. But we didn't."

"Oh, dear girl." Narcissa clucked her tongue sympathetically. "Well, I suppose that's something, then. Should you and Draco marry someday, we won't have to tell your children their mummy once shagged their grandfather."

"What?" Hermione looked horrified. "Married? Grandchildren? Draco and I – we're friends! I thought… until this morning, I thought he had a girlfriend! And was quite in love! And then, to see him with Astoria…" Hermione's face changed as she fully registered the events of the morning. "He's angry with me for spending the night with Lucius, but he spent the night with Astoria! If he fancied me, why would he fall into bed with her? That hypocritical little ferret!"

"Men will fall into bed with any woman who'll fall into bed with them," said Narcissa dismissively. "Within reason, of course. But he's fancied you for months. You're his friend – how could you _not_ know?"

"I had no idea!" Hermione insisted, but even as she said the words, her mind began replaying memories for her: cuddling with him on the couch, watching movies. Laughing over a cup of tea or coffee. Lunch breaks spent together. That time they went shopping for office supplies on Ministry time and accidentally spent half the afternoon at Weasley's Wizards Wheezes checking out gag gifts instead. Her face crumpled.

"It's obvious now, looking back, isn't it?" asked Narcissa gently.

The house elf reappeared then, carrying a tray on which she'd set coffee, milk, sugar, two glasses of orange juice, toast, and jam.

"I thought Mistress might be hungry," said the elf.

"Yes, this is good." She motioned for the elf to set the tray on the coffee table between the two chairs, then waved her wand to make it taller, so they'd not have to stoop to reach their drinks. The elf bowed and disapparated. Narcissa reached for an ashtray to stub out her cigarette.

Hermione gratefully drank half her juice in two sips.

"Why haven't you ever had good sex?" asked Narcissa, lifting her mug to her lips.

Hermione seemed surprised by the question.

"I don't know. I just… haven't. Usually, while the wizard is… working… my mind is elsewhere. And what he's doing doesn't… interest me. Not more than thinking about work or the latest book I've read, at any rate."

"You haven't found the right wizard then. Or witch." Narcissa narrowed her eyes. "Are you secretly interested in witches? Perhaps that's your issue."

"No!" Hermione set down the juice. "Not that there's anything wrong with that, but-"

"Maybe it's not the wizard, then. Maybe it's you."

"Me?"

"How was my husband?"

"I told you, we didn't…" Her face went fiery red again. "We didn't have sex."

"You must have had _something_ to have spent all night in bed. Did he tell you he was the one who had that mirror installed on the ceiling? If so, he lied. I did that. For myself. I used to be bored, too. It gave me something to concentrate on, and as I became more comfortable with myself, I became more comfortable with him, and before long, our sex life was-"

"Forgive me, Mrs. Malfoy, but I don't think this is a conversation you and I should be having!"

"I apologize. I'm feeling tense. Upset. When I'm tense and upset, I have a tendency to speak whatever is on my mind. But Draco hates it when I talk to him about my sex life with his father, too."

"Can't imagine why." Hermione was feeling a sudden surge of intense sympathy for her friend. His parents were a lot to take individually. She couldn't fathom what it had been like when they were together. Her own parents had never been quite so…

Much.

"It was a shock, that's all, finding you in bed with him." She reached for the cigarette pack, but her hands were shaking slightly. She needed something else. Waving her wand, she Accioed over a small tin from above the fireplace, opened it, and removed rolling papers.

Hermione nibbled a piece of toast.

"Mind if I smoke?" asked Narcissa.

"You were already smoking," said Hermione.

"I'm going to smoke something else," said Narcissa. She added what looked like minced green herbs to the center of the paper. "Care to partake?"

"What is it?"

"Marijuana." She lit the end with her wand and took a long drag.

Hermione was fortunate her eyeballs were naturally secured into her head, because if she had magical ones like Alastor Moody they'd have fallen out and rolled away across the floor at this.

"You…?"

"I told you, I'm feeling tense and upset. And as you so kindly pointed out, it's a bit early to start drinking. Here." Narcissa offered her the joint. "Try it. It'll relax you."

"I… I don't need to relax," Hermione said stuffily, sitting up straighter, hands folded in her lap. "Thank you."

"You've never in your life had good sex, you spent the night with my husband, and you've just learned that my son, your friend, made up a nonsense girlfriend to get your attention because he's secretly fancied you for months. And now you're sitting here in my home, with me, having an incredibly uncomfortable conversation. How could you possibly feel relaxed?"

"Maybe just a little…" Hermione took the joint, brought it to her lips, breathed in… and promptly began to cough. Smoke left her mouth as if she was concealing a chimney between her cheeks. Some even burned through her nose.

"That's not how you do it." Narcissa took it back and demonstrated. "Here, now you keep this one and I'll roll another."

Before long, the toast was gone, the juice was gone, the coffee was gone, and two joints were gone.

And then Hermione and Narcissa were _gone_.

When Draco came through the door, his father hot on his heels, it was to find both women sitting on the floor with their backs against the wall, laughing so hard tears were streaming liberally down their cheeks.

"What is this?" asked Lucius, gesturing down at them. His hair was shorter than Narcissa had seen it in years, coming to a blunt end just under his ears.

"Mother?" Draco looked from one woman to the other. "Hermione?!"

"We're…" (giggle) "Both feeling…" (giggle) "Much better…" (giggle) "Now!" Narcissa announced, her fingers pinching the one she'd just rolled but not yet lit. "Where's my wand?"

"Narcissa!" Lucius exclaimed in a scandalized, scolding tone. "The girl is _our son's age_ , and you're _smoking_ with her?"

Narcissa chuckled. "You went to bed with her! Or… tried to."

"Shhhhh…" said Hermione quite loudly, patting Narcissa's arm as if she were a bunny. "Shhh, he doesn't need to know what I told you."

"I thought this situation couldn't get any worse." Draco both looked and sounded stunned. "But look at that. I was wrong."

"So uptight, Draco." Hermione snickered. "Here, have a… this is a marijuana. Cigarette. A Marijuana cigarette. For smoking." She held out her hand as if still holding the joint, but there was nothing between her fingers. "Oh, wait, I smoked it all."

This, for some reason, sent Narcissa and Hermione back into hysterics.

"I'm Floo calling Severus." Draco stalked to the fireplace, checking the mantle for Floo Powder. "Surely, he has a potion to combat the effects of this."

"No," said Lucius. "He doesn't. We typically just wait it out."

"This has happened before?!" Come to think of it, Draco sort of recognized the smell… he used to smell it coming from the pool area during his parents' confusing parties back when he was a kid… he'd hide in the greenhouse and could smell it wafting into the space… he'd assumed the strong skunky scent came from one of the plants.

Apparently, he'd been partly correct.

Lucius put his back to the wall and sunk to the floor beside his wife.

"Have you got any more?" he asked.

"Father!"

"There's an old adage, son: If you can't beat them, join them."

"This isn't happening." Draco pressed his palms against his eyelids and breathed deeply… but not _too_ deeply, just in case. He didn't want to beat them or join them. He wanted to go back in time to before he walked into this room. Before Hermione went to bed with his father. Before he invented stupid Mary Sue in the first place. Before he'd asked either of his idiot parents for love advice, which he should've known would be a mistake considering how completely fucked up the two of them were.

"Sit with us, love." Narcissa patted the floor between herself and Hermione. "Though if you truly think you'd rather Floo Severus, go ahead. Tell him to come by." She smiled and passed the joint over to her husband.

"Call him now," said Lucius. "Why not? We're all here, we have nowhere else to be, and we haven't smoked with him in ages."

* * *

 **A/N:**

I know, I haven't updated in almost 2 months. I'm sorry! In case you missed my note in my profile or in my other fics, I had to go on a hiatus for a little while when work-related writing and editing got to be too much, leaving me little time for fanfiction, plus I had the additional difficulty with two of my fics (this and Andromeda Tonks) that the chapters I was trying to write just weren't working the way I wanted them to.

This ended up being unlike what I'd planned, but I hope you like it! Trying to balance genres since it's both romance and humor but with some drama/sadness infused. Let me know what you think!

Thanks for reading, reviewing, following, and adding to faves!

 **-AL**


	13. Chapter 13

**CHAPTER THIRTEEN**

 _ **"I guess she gave you things**_  
 _ **I didn't give to you..."**_

 **-Adele**

By the time Severus arrived, Lucius was as high as Narcissa and Hermione, and Draco was trying to shake the feeling he'd woken up to an alternate reality this morning.

"I've always loved you," said Lucius, his hand on his wife's inner thigh. The joint-passing trio were still seated on the floor, backs to the wall, while Draco paced. They each took a long drag before handing it to the next person, but the young blond wanted no part of it.

"You seem tense, Draco," said Severus in his usual dry way. "If only there were a cure for that."

He gaped at his former professor. "I'm not losing my marbles like these three, if that's what you're suggesting!" He turned to glower down at Hermione. "I would have thought I could expect better from you! Hermione Granger, doing illicit drugs? Even Rita Skeeter wouldn't bloody believe it!"

"I'm sorry, Draco!" Hermione tried to keep her face straight and expressionless, but failed spectacularly. "Your mother can be _very_ persuasive."

"Another of her fine qualities." Lucius pulled Narcissa into his lap so she was straddling him and drew her into a kiss.

"We should leave them be." Severus glanced their way before turning his attention back to Draco. "They'll pet and paw at each other for a few minutes, then probably fall asleep."

"How do you know?" asked Draco.

"I used to attend their pool parties."

Draco blanched. Hermione giggled. While she couldn't shake the feeling this should bother her, thanks to the amount she'd smoked, she also couldn't help feeling nothing would ever bother her again. Who knew the key to true euphoria was a little green herb sprinkled inside rolling papers and lit by Narcissa Malfoy's wand?

"Come on!" urged Draco, standing by the door. Severus was already in the hall.

The trio left the married couple snogging each other senseless on the floor, shutting the door behind them. Draco led the way to the kitchen.

"Brilliant!" said Hermione when she realized where they were. "I'm ravenous!"

"Not surprised." Snape lifted his wand. "Accio Cauldron Cakes!"

A package flew out from one of the cupboards.

"They're they best for what ails them in their condition," he explained to Draco, who looked surprised to find Snape knew the contents of his mother's cupboards. "I therefore presumed Narcissa would have some hidden away."

"What were their parties like, Professor?" asked Hermione. "Classy and upscale, or running rampant with debauchery?"

"You don't want to know." Draco helped himself to a butterbeer, then opened two more for the others. "I used to spy on them sometimes. The things I've seen…" He shuddered.

"Nonsense. They were fine." Severus, who was sitting across from Draco and Hermione, averted his gaze from one to the other and back again. "Miss Granger, you don't have to inhale the cake as you did the marijuana. By all means, _chew_."

"Shrry." Her apology was lost to a mouthful of chocolate.

"Why are you here?"

"I wanted to talk to my mother. I thought she'd understand how betrayed I feel." Draco shot a sharp look at Hermione. Severus cocked an eyebrow.

"I was asking Miss Granger," he said, but before he could add any more, Hermione slammed down the cake, Draco's words seemingly sobering her.

"Excuse me? Betrayed? By whom?"

"Mother was betrayed by father-"

"Your father and mother have been separated for how long?" She was positively glaring at him. "And how many wizards has she been seen with since?"

He ignored this. "And _I_ was betrayed by-"

"If you say _me_ , Draco Malfoy, I'm going to transfigure you into a joint and set your arse on fire!"

Severus snorted.

"How can you say that?" Draco appeared genuinely hurt. "After what you did?"

"What I did? I _in no way_ betrayed you! I had _no idea_ you were interested in me – I thought you had a lovely girlfriend, remember? – and even if I _had_ known the truth, I don't _owe_ _you_ my affections!"

"No, that's true." He reached for a Cauldron Cake. "But as my friend, you might have told me the man you were dating happened to be my father, rather than letting me find out after you woke up together across the hall from my bedroom."

"Oh, that." She went slightly pink. "Yes, I suppose that I could have told you that."

In the sitting room, Lucius and Narcissa were indeed engaged in romantic activities, peppered with apologies.

"I'm sorry, my love." Lucius kissed and sucked at her neck, running his hands up and down her back, from her shoulders to her arse. "I'm sorry. I love you. I'm sorry you had to find us that way. I'm sorry I pushed you away."

"I'm sorry I left you, my love." She caught his cheeks between her hands and kissed him soundly. "I wanted you to get help, I wanted to start living again, but I hate being without you, I hate thinking of you with someone else."

His hand went to her breast as her long nails scratched the back of his neck.

"I wish we were better parents." His lips trailed from hers down her throat, across her chest, to the exposed flesh above her neckline. He squeezed her breast and nipped at her skin, eliciting a moan. "Draco hates us."

"Don't be ridiculous, dear." She thrust against him, a simulation of what she wanted, and dug her nails into the back of his neck, under his hair. "He only hates you. I'm a fine parent. I didn't try to shag his little girlfriend."

"She wasn't his girlfriend." His mouth found hers again and they snogged for several seconds before he pulled away to add, "And trust me, you would have enjoyed her just as much as I did."

"That's highly inappropriate, my darling." She bit his lip, holding it between her teeth, and flicked her tongue against it. This move always drove him wild. She gave him a quick peck and pulled back. "What if they end up together?"

Lucius hugged her tightly around the waist. "I don't care if they do. I want him to be happy."

Narcissa wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her chest to his. "Yes. And I want _us_ to be happy."

"I'm starving."

"Me, too." She started to get up, but he yanked her back to his lap.

"No." He palmed her arse and snuggled close to the crook of her neck. "Let's smoke one more before we face them."

Her lips twisted into a grin. "Alright."

Back in the kitchen…

"I tried to warn you about Lucius, Miss Granger." Severus took a swig of the butterbeer and pulled a face, as it wasn't one of his favorite drinks – too sweet. "But you went and got it in your head that I'd fallen in love with you and subsequently offered to match me with a dowdy old biddy from your work. Lucius never had any genuine interest in you, did he? He's likely on that floor shagging his dear wife as we speak, without you warranting a second thought."

"Doubt that," muttered Draco.

"That witch from work is not dowdy, nor is she old, sir!" Hermione pushed away her cake. She no longer had an appetite. "And I don't care what Lucius is doing with his wife. We're through."

"He's not _doing_ anything or _anyone_ , for that matter. That's the trouble!" said Draco. Catching Severus' confused expression, he expounded. "He can't. Hasn't been able to in years, since Azkaban. She wanted him to get help but he refused, and that's why she left."

"Oh?" The potion-master's eyes widened. "OH."

"Oh?" said Hermione, sounding dejected. "Oh."

Severus Snape's brow furrowed with confusion. "Then what did you spend the night doing together, Miss Granger?"

"None of your bloody business, Professor Snape!" Her voice rose several octaves. "It's none of anybody's business what he and I were doing all ni-"

"Severus, darling?" Narcissa entered the kitchen, Lucius close behind. "Don't worry about the children. Draco was having a bit of a conniption, but he's alright now. Aren't you, dear?"

"Really, Mother? How can you be so calm?"

"I'm more baked than that Cauldron Cake, love. I'll be calm for the next several hours."

"You used to do that at your pool parties when I was small, didn't you? I could smell it from the greenhouse."

"What were you doing in the greenhouse during our parties?" Lucius pulled out a chair for his wife, next to Severus, across from Hermione, then settled himself at the head of the table. "You were supposed to be in bed. Those parties were not child-appropriate."

"I don't think now is the best time to discuss those parties." Draco sneered. "I'd rather discuss how you ended up taking to bed my friend – a girl you hardly know! – and I'd also like to know why Mother seems to have completely forgiven you for it already. And I don't think being 'baked' in an answer."

"Draco, dear…" Narcissa placed her cigarette pack on the table, removed a stick, and offered the pack to Severus, who also took one. "Your father took more women to bed before his stay in Azkaban than I can possible begin to count. She's just one more."

Hermione folded her arms on the table and dropped her head down on top of them, hiding behind her hair. Draco slammed his hand on the table.

"Father!"

"What?" Lucius reached across the table to take Draco's barely sipped butterbeer. "I always came back to my wife. Unlike your mother."

"I haven't got a wife to come back to," she quipped.

"No, but you've had your share of men since our split, haven't you?"

Her eyes flashed. "But I didn't have a single one – not a single one – before our separation. You were it for me. The only man for me. Remember?"

"Yes." He took a long swig. "The only man. But how many women, Narcissa?"

Her jaw dropped as if she couldn't believe her own ears. Draco and Hermione wore similar expressions.

"Lucuis Abraxas Malfoy! How dare you!" She swatted at him. "Women don't count! _Me_ being with _women_ would be like _you_ being with… with _Severus_!"

Narcissa, Lucius, Draco, and Hermione all turned their attention toward the potions-master, who had the cigarette halfway to his lips. He froze and stared back at them for several seconds before saying, "No, thank you."

"This is too much." Draco buried his face in his hands, his elbows on the table, and groaned.

"We've discussed it, Draco, and your mother and I believe it's time to be honest with you. You're an adult now. You can handle it."

"Yes." Narcissa reached diagonally across the table to squeeze his wrist reassuringly. "Is there anything you need to know? About… anything?" She glanced at the girl. "Or… you? Do you have questions?"

"So many questions," admitted Hermione. "But I won't ask them. I… I think there are some things best left unknown."

"I think I need a shower," said Lucius.

"I think I need a real breakfast," said Narcissa.

"I think I need a stiffer drink," said Draco.

"I think I need one of those joints," said Severus. "I deserve it for giving up my morning for this nonsense."

* * *

 **A/N:**

So... should Severus partake? Should Lucius get help for his problem? Should Draco ask out Hermione, or are they better as friends? lol :) I realize that this fic has gotten awfully silly - I think I need it to be, considering how heavy my other current stories are and how stressful my life is at the present - but I'm enjoying writing it and hope you all still like reading it.

Thanks!

 **-AL**


End file.
